Computer vision ramps as Intel, Amazon, Google push ahead

Intel's move to put its RealSense 3D Cameras in laptops in the second half of 2014 and tablets in early 2015, coupled with Amazon's Fire Phone and Google's Project Tango, are all pointing to early commercialization efforts for computer vision, which allows devices to see depth.

On Tuesday, Intel's Future Showcase, a view of the tech world five years from now, rolled through New York and computer vision via gesture viewing, face tracking and integrated 3D depth cameras played a big role. Rest assured that these RealSense cameras will ultimately make it to Intel's open source Jimmy the Robot efforts (currently $1,600 for a version that can be 3D printed and $16,000 for one that's more suited to universities).

Brian David Johnson, Intel's futurist, said computer vision could change the robotic equation dramatically and allow them to sense depth and avoid pitfalls. "If 3D cameras can fit in a laptop it'll easily fit on Jimmy," said Johnson.

Project Tango, an effort by Google, also launched a tablet reference kit for developers. The aim is to create new experiences for consumers and businesses. In the end, Google will want to scan rooms and settings just like it does streets. Naturally, advertising and data nuggets will provide an overlay.

read full article at ZDnet

New guidelines to help EU businesses use the Cloud

Guidelines to help business users save money and get the most out of cloud computing services are being presented to the European Commission today. Cloud computing allows individuals, businesses and the public sector to store their data and carry out data processing in remote data centres, saving on average 10-20%.

 The guidelines have been developed by a Cloud Select Industry Group as part of the Commission’s European Cloud Strategy to increase trust in these services. Contributors to the guidelines include Arthur's Legal, ATOS, Cloud Security Alliance, ENISA, IBM, Microsoft and SAP, Telecom Italia, (complete member list here).

 Today's announcement is a first step towards standardised building blocks for Service Level Agreements (SLAs) terminology and metrics. An SLA is a part of a service contract that defines the technical and legal aspects of the service offered. The recent findings of the Trusted Cloud Europe survey show SLA standards are very much required by cloud users.

These guidelines will help professional cloud users ensure essential elements are included in plain language in contracts they make with cloud providers. Relevant items include:

• The availability and reliability of the cloud service,
• The quality of support services they will receive from their cloud provider
• Security levels
• How to better manage the data they keep in the cloud.

European Commission Vice-President @NeelieKroesEU said: "This is the first time cloud suppliers have agreed on common guidelines for service level agreements. I think small businesses in particular will benefit from having these guidelines at hand when searching for cloud services.”

read more at European Commission

US Judge: Warrantless Bulk Surveillance Is Legal

A federal judge has affirmed the legality of the U.S. government's bulk collection of phone and email data from foreign nationals living outside the country — including their contact with U.S. citizens — in denying a man's motion to dismiss his terrorism conviction.

It was the first legal challenge to the government's bulk data-collection program of non-U.S. citizens living overseas after revelations about massive, warrantless surveillance were made public by former National Security Agency employee Edward Snowden.

The program also sweeps up information about U.S. citizens who have contact with overseas suspects. This type of surveillance played a key role in this case.

 Lawyers for Mohamed Mohamud, a U.S. citizen who lived in Oregon, tried to show the program violated his constitutional rights and was more broadly unconstitutional. U.S. District Judge Garr King on Tuesday denied that effort.

The ruling also upheld Mohamud's conviction on terrorism charges. In his decision, King rejected the argument from Mohamud's attorneys that prosecutors failed to notify Mohamud of information derived under the U.S. Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act until he was already convicted.

 read full article at ABC News

"Factsheet EU-US Negotiations on Data Protection" (the sequel of an epic story...)

...
What are the outstanding challenges?
A critical outstanding issue which remains is the right of effective judicial redress that should be granted by the U.S. to EU citizens not resident in the U.S. (i.e. ensuring that EU citizens not resident in the U.S. enjoy the same rights as those enjoyed by U.S. nationals in the EU today).

 This is significant for two reasons: first ensuring equal treatment, meaning that EU citizens who don’t live in the U.S. can obtain the same treatment in terms of judicial redress (meaning they can go to court) as U.S citizens, and secondly ensuring the enforceability of the rights set out in the EU-U.S. agreement. This is an issue which is at the core of the negotiating mandate the Council gave to the Commission.

 A satisfactory solution is yet to be found on this point. The U.S. recognises how critical this issue is for the EU, and has committed to identifying ways of addressing it, such as through legislative action in Congress. While this commitment from the U.S. side is welcome, a workable legislative solution is yet to be proposed by the U.S.

read full report at European Commission 

 

TTIP is a land of opportunity for small businesses

TTIP represents a land of opportunity for businesses. Opening up markets on both sides of the Atlantic will create a wealth of business opportunities, and EU negotiators should adopt a small business perspective, too, writes David Caro.

 David Caro is president of the European Small Business Alliance and EU and International Affairs Policy Chairman for the Federation of Small Businesses (FSB).

 The Trans Atlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) could well be the biggest and most important trade agreement in history. It is almost a year since the negotiations started, and from the very beginning both sides agreed that this trade deal should include small businesses. This inclusion comes in the form of a specific Small Business Chapter. The European Small Business Alliance (ESBA), and our members believe this represents a unique chance for small firms to shape, and benefit from this deal.

read full article at EurActive

Antitrust: Commission finds that Motorola Mobility infringed EU competition rules by misusing standard essential patents

The European Commission today adopted a decision which finds that Motorola Mobility's (Motorola) seeking and enforcement of an injunction against Apple before a German court on the basis of a smartphone standard essential patent (SEP) constitutes an abuse of a dominant position prohibited by EU antitrust rules in view of the particular circumstances in which the injunction was used (see also MEMO/14/322). The Commission has ordered Motorola to eliminate the negative effects resulting from it. The Commission has also taken a commitment decision in a separate investigation concerning Samsung (see IP/14/490).

 Commission Vice President in charge of competition policy Joaquín Almunia said: "The so-called smartphone patent wars should not occur at the expense of consumers. This is why all industry players must comply with the competition rules. Our decision on Motorola, together with today's decision to accept Samsung's commitments, provides legal clarity on the circumstances in which injunctions to enforce standard essential patents can be anti-competitive. This will also contribute to ensuring the proper functioning of standard-setting in Europe. While patent holders should be fairly remunerated for the use of their intellectual property, implementers of such standards should also get access to standardised technology on fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory terms. It is by preserving this balance that consumers will continue to have access to a wide choice of interoperable products".

 SEPs are patents essential to implement a specific industry standard. It is not possible to manufacture products that comply with a certain standard without accessing these patents. This may give companies owning SEPs significant market power. As a result, standards bodies generally require their members to commit to license SEPs on fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory (so-called "FRAND") terms. This commitment is designed to ensure effective access to a standard for all market players and to prevent "hold-up" by a single SEP holder. Such access on FRAND terms allows a wide choice of interoperable products for consumers while ensuring that SEP holders are adequately remunerated for their intellectual property.

read full article at European Commission

Antitrust: Commission welcomes General Court judgment upholding its decision against Intel

The European Commission welcomes today's judgment by the General Court (case T-286/09) which fully upholds the Commission's 2009 Decision which found that Intel had abused its dominant position and which imposed on Intel a fine of €1.06 billion (see IP/09/745). The judgment is significant because it confirms that the Commission was fully justified in pursuing the anticompetitive conduct in question in a major worldwide market. The Commission will continue to vigorously pursue abuses of dominant market positions, which restrict competition in the Single Market to the detriment of consumers.

On 13 May 2009, the Commission adopted a decision prohibiting Intel's anticompetitive conduct under Article 7 of the EU's Antitrust Regulation (Regulation 1/2003). The decision concluded that Intel had, in breach of Article 102 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (ex Article 82 of the EC Treaty), engaged in two types of abuse of its dominant position in the x86 CPU market – i.e. essentially, the market for computer chips. These were:

(1) granting rebates to 4 PC and server manufacturers (Dell, HP, NEC, Lenovo) conditional on them obtaining all or almost all of their supplies from Intel, and payments to one downstream computer retailer (Media Markt) conditional on it only selling PCs with Intel CPUs ("conditional rebates"); and

(2) granting direct payments to 3 computer manufacturers (HP, Acer and Lenovo) to halt, delay or limit the launch of specific products incorporating chips from Intel’s only rival, AMD (so-called “naked restrictions”).

read full article at Europen Commission

Antitrust: Commission adopts revised safe harbour rules for minor agreements ("De Minimis Notice")

The European Commission has issued revised rules (its so-called "De Minimis Notice") for assessing when minor agreements between companies are not caught by the general prohibition of anticompetitive practices under EU competition law. The Notice facilitates the assessment of compliance with EU antitrust rules for companies, especially SMEs. At the same time it allows the Commission to concentrate its resources on agreements with a higher risk of distorting competition in the Single Market. See also MEMO/14/440.

Article 101 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU) prohibits agreements that are aimed at or result in appreciable restrictions of competition. The revised De Minimis Notice, in line with its predecessor (see IP/02/13), defines what the Commission considers not to be an appreciable restriction of competition by reference to market share thresholds. It creates a "safe harbour" for companies whose market shares do not exceed 10% for agreements between competitors or 15% for agreements between non-competitors. These are unchanged from the previous Notice.

The main change in the revised Notice is that it clarifies that agreements aimed at restricting competition (so-called restrictions "by object", because they have an anti-competitive object) cannot be considered minor and always constitute an appreciable restriction of competition, in violation of Article 101(1) TFEU. These agreements can never benefit from this safe harbour. This was confirmed by the Court of Justice of the European Union in the Expedia judgment (case C-226/11), following a question referred to it by a French court.

read full article at European Commission

Luigi Gambardella (ETNO): “Innovation and investments need significant changes to the regulatory environment”

Also on my behalf, a warm welcome to the third ETNO-MLex Regulatory summit. Last time we spoke, at the April workshop on the Italian EU Presidency, it was before the European elections.

As Daniel just reminded us, these days Europe is discussing its new leadership, but policymakers and stakeholders have also effectively started shaping the debate on the policy and regulatory landscape in which we will work for the coming five years.

ETNO has been the strong and reliable voice of the telecoms industry in Brussels for over 20 years.

Our companies are Europe’s digital spine: they have been and they will be the enabler of a smarter, more competitive and prosperous Continent.

Then, in the context of today’s regulatory conference, let me tell you upfront what our advocacy objective is in this field: ETNO and its members want to promote innovation and investments in network infrastructures. And we believe that this cannot be achieved without significant changes to the regulatory environment.

read full article at Broadband4Europe

Philips, Infineon, Samsung face EU antitrust fines

EU regulators are poised to fine Philips, Samsung Electronics Co Ltd and Infineon Technologies AG in the coming weeks for fixing prices of chips used in mobile SIM cards, two people familiar with the case said on Tuesday.

The case started with dawn raids on the companies by the European Commission in October 2008.

The European Union watchdog charged them last year with taking part in a cartel.

The chips are also used in passports, bank cards, identity cards and television systems.

"The companies may be fined in late July or possibly September," said one of the sources, who declined to be named as the EU decision is not yet public.

Officials with the commission, Philips and Infineon declined to comment. Samsung officials were not immediately available for comment. Philips said last year that the EU charges covered the period 2003 to 2004 and involved its semiconductor business which it has since sold.


 read full article at Reuters

Quirky to Create a Smart-Home Products Company

The repurposed red brick warehouse in Manhattan’s Chelsea neighborhood is a bustling hub of modern industrial activity. Skilled young workers are hunched over pristine machine tools and 3-D printers that churn out prototype products.

 This is the home of Quirky, a start-up that now fields 4,000 new product ideas a week, picks three winners and then takes over all aspects of production, from making blueprints to marketing the goods through big-box retailers like Home Depot and retail websites, including Amazon.

 Most of Quirky’s top-selling products have been inventive, stand-alone devices — like a power strip that pivots so a plug never blocks an adjacent socket, and a plastic stem that inserts into a lemon or lime and becomes a push-button citrus spritzer.

 read full article at The Wahington Post

"Study: 7 in 10 concerned about security of Internet-of-Things" (after all this adverse publicity...)

The Internet-of-Things is a thing. If you haven’t heard about it yet, get ready because we’re in the early stages of an explosion of technology that will connect, monitor, and in some cases share almost every aspect of our lives. Fortinet conducted a survey of consumers to find out what people think about the security and privacy concerns of the Internet-of-Things.

The survey, titled “Internet of Things: Connected Home,” was produced in partnership with GMI, a division of Lightspeed Research. More than 1,800 consumers between the ages of 20 and 50 who claim to be tech savvy participated in the survey, which was administered in 11 countries around the world, including the United States, Australia, China, Germany, India, and the United Kingdom.

The majority of those surveyed believe that a connected home—a home in which household appliances and home electronics are seamlessly connected to the Internet—is “extremely likely” to be a reality in the next five years. The actual number was 61 percent in the United States, and an overwhelming 84 percent in China.

Four out of 10 people indicated they’d be willing to pay more for a home that was optimized to take advantage of IoT technologies (nearly half if you include the “maybe” group). Half of those surveyed also said they’d be willing to pay more for better Internet service capable of smoothly handling an
IoT connected home environment. Fewer than 20 percent of respondents from the United States stated they would absolutely not pay more for Internet service to accommodate IoT.


by Tony Bradley
read full article at PcWorld