Welcome to the Techmeme Ride Home for Wednesday, August 14, 2024, I'm Brian McCulloch today. All the details from yesterday's Pixel event, but especially the AI features that show maybe how far ahead Google is, at least when it comes to putting AI on phones. We have official post-clonum computing cryptography standards and, why they're using iPhones to make off-sides calls in soccer this season. Here's what you missed today in the world of tech. So I am glad I waited to do the Pixel stuff.
Let's do a quick rundown of the hardware announces from yesterday so I can get to the more interesting bits of news. You had the Google Pixel 9 with a tensor g4 chip, a design with flat sides, a bigger 6.3-inch screen, and AI features, more on those in a second, all on sale starting August 22, starting at $799.
A 6.3-inch Pixel 9 Pro and a 6.8-inch 9 Pro XL with 120Hz super-actual displays, tensor g4, 16GB of RAM, 45W fast charging in 4 colors and priced at $999 and $1099 respectively, and up of course that's just the starting prices. There was the Pixel Watch 3 in 41mm and 45mm sizes with a 2000-knit display, 16% smaller bezels starting at $349. There were new Pixel Buds Pro 2 for $229 with a tensor AI chip smaller and lighter than the original pros with improved noise cancellation and sound quality.
There was also the $1799 plus Pixel 9 Pro Fold Google's second take on that foldable category with a larger 8-inch and 6.3-inch inner and outer displays, 4650 milliamp hour battery shipping September 4. Now here's the interesting bits. Of course Google also announced a bunch of AI stuff and quoting no less than Mark German on Twitter after watching Google's latest AI announcements. It's hard to believe Apple is anything other than 2-3 years behind in this area, at least.
And quote, let's run down some of the interesting AI stuff from a wired quote. First up, add me. You've probably been in a situation where you want to take a selfie with your partner or family in front of a subject like the Eiffel Tower, but someone has to take the picture right? Instead of handing your $1000 phone to a stranger, add me accomplishes the same task. This is a special mode in the Pixel 9 phones that first asked you to scan the surrounding area briefly.
Then you'll snap a picture of your loved one in front of the subject and then swap places. When they take over photo capture duties, they'll see a faded out image of themselves in the camera preview and the camera Apple suggests a place for the second person to stand. Once they press the shutter button, it'll superimpose the images so it appears as if both people were standing right next to each other even when they weren't.
It worked well in my brief testing and naturally I tried to see if I could duplicate myself. This worked once, but every other attempt failed. That's because Google says it was not designed for the same person to show up twice. Maybe if you change your shirt or try to look different enough, it might do the trick. I'll need to do more testing to see how well it works when you want to put your hand around another person's shoulder. Next, reimagine in Magic Editor.
Reimagine is the latest addition to Google's Magic Editor which currently lets you move objects around a photo or erase objects. This new tool lets you select an area of a photo and then a text prompt pops up where you can type in what you want to see as your end result. This can be anything ranging from turning the photo from daytime to nighttime, adding stormy clouds or like I tried adding a UFO over the Empire State Building. The more descriptive you are, the better the results.
However, Google says it works best with backgrounds and objects instead of people. There are guardrails in place so that you don't alter how someone looks. It's similar to Samsung's sketch-to-image feature in its latest folding phones except Samsung asks you to sketch what you want to see rather than using text. Reimagine isn't perfect. Sometimes it didn't produce results with what I typed in and sometimes the results were just plain bad.
But you do get four results to choose from and you can always try again and be more descriptive. Finally, there's auto-frame. Auto-frame is important in photography and if adding grid lines to your camera app doesn't help you line things up, yes, most smartphone cameras offer this feature in the camera settings. Google thinks this is another task generative AI can help with. Auto-frame lives in magic editor much like Reimagine.
Once you're editing a photo, you'll see the option to select Auto-frame. Tap this and it'll generate four images with different framing. For example, I intentionally took a photo where I was standing very close to the edge of the frame. Not great compositionally. I used auto-frame and it generated pixels above and to the right of me pushing me closer to the center following the classic rule of thirds. It even gave me a vertical crop of an original horizontal photo.
These generated pixels essentially understand the context of the photos and expand the edges of the frame so that it looks natural even if it's all artificial. In the images I tested it with, it did not know how much of the tree was really to my left or how far the fence went so it made assumptions. If you look closely, you can probably find some mistakes but most people will never notice the difference. One more. Finally there is Zoom Enhance.
Google announced Zoom Enhance with the Pixel 8 but it never shipped because it wasn't ready. Now it's finally launching in the Pixel 9 series and will arrive to Pixel 8 phones at a later date. Currently, if you zoom into a photo pre-capture, Google uses its super-res Zoom algorithm to ensure the image is sharper than what you'd get with a typically digitally zoomed in photo. Zoom Enhance, however, is post-capture as a feature.
And the Google Photos app select a photo that you want to zoom in on, tap the Edit button, and then go to Tools to find Zoom Enhance. You'll have to zoom to the area you want and then tap Zoom Enhance. And just like in the early 2000's CSI shows, it'll enhance the photo by generating pixels to make it appear sharper. I tried it on some far-away buildings and the results delivered sharper lines that looked much cleaner than the previously pixelated image.
Google also announced Gemini will replace Google Assistant Full Stop as the default on the Pixel 9 lineup. However, users can go back to the classic Google Assistant if they want. This is all in aid of the debut of Gemini Live, quoting the Verge. Available for Gemini Advanced subscribers, it works a lot like ChatGPT's Voice Chat feature with multiple voices to choose from and the ability to speak conversationally, even to the point of interrupting it without tapping a button.
Google says that conversations with Gemini Live can be free-flowing so you can do things like interrupt and answer mid-sentence or pause the conversation and come back to it later. Gemini Live will also work in the background or when your phone is locked. Google first announced that Gemini Live was coming during its IO developer conference earlier this year where it also said Gemini Live would be able to interpret video in real time.
Google also has 10 new Gemini voices for users to pick from with names like Ersa and Dipper. The feature has started rolling out today in English only for Android devices. The company says it will come to iOS and get more languages, quote, in the coming weeks. End quote. Yeah, why partner with OpenAI when you can just insert your own AI as your Siri killer yourself? Let me do a quick sort of omnibus segment here to shoehorn in two different sort of follow-up stories.
First, Apple has approved Spotify updating its app to show in app pricing information for iPhone users in the EU starting today after Spotify's, you know, years-long legal battle about all this. Quoting the verge. One thing that's missing is the ability to click a link to make those purchases from outside the Apple App Store.
Spotify says it's opting into the music streaming services entitlement that Apple introduced after being served with a $2 billion EU antitrust fine in March for abusing its dominant position in music streaming rather than accepting the complicated new developer terms Apple outlined last week. Unlike the entitlement, the latter would allow EU developers to link to external payment options with Apple taking a cut off of platform sales.
Spotify clearly doesn't want to do that saying that Apple is demanding, quote, illegal and predatory taxes. And then, I believe the phrase I used was burning everything that was flammable just to stay alive. According to public filings, Intel sold 1.18 million shares that it owned in ARM during Q2, which would have raised around $147 million for the company based on the stock's average price in the quarter.
Many cybersecurity startups or anybody that knows a cybersecurity company just getting started that is listening to me right now. Listen even more closely. Data Tribe has started accepting applications for its 2024 Challenge Program and Live Pitch event. The Data Tribe Challenge is a unique program to accelerate your cybersecurity startup. Workshop your messaging with startup veterans and meet potential investors and customers.
Data Tribe will pick five finalists to join their program, receive coaching from their team of startup veterans, present at the live event, and benefit from free promotion and press coverage. Finalists share $25,000 in prizes and all will receive the title of Data Tribe Challenge finalist. It's very easy to apply. Just go to datatrib.com slash challenge to enter a short bit of company information and upload your pitch.
Data Tribe will be accepting submissions until September 27th and will announce five finalists on October 18th. Make sure to apply soon to do so. Just go to datatrib.com slash challenge. That's datatrib.com slash challenge. No man wants to lose his hair but for men it's actually very common and now with him's the solution is simple. Apply him's hair loss solutions and you'll be joining hundreds of thousands of subscribers who got their flow back.
Him's provides access to a range of hair loss treatments that work all from the comfort of your couch. Him's makes treating hair loss simple with doctor trusted treatment options and clinically proven ingredients like finesse to ride and manoxidil that can regrow hair in as little as three to six months. They offer personalized chewable oral spray and serum treatment options so you can find what works best for you.
The process is simple and 100% online just to answer a few questions and a medical provider will determine if treatment is right for you. If prescribed, your treatment is sent directly to your door. Start your free online visit today at him's.com slash ride. That's him s.com slash ride for your personalized hair loss treatment options. Him's.com slash ride results very based on studies of topical and oral manoxidil.
Prescription products require an online consultation with a healthcare provider who will determine if a prescription is appropriate, restrictions apply, see website for full details and important safety information. The US NIST has published its first three post quantum cryptography standards. IBM's director of research thinks quantum will hit an inflection point sometime around 2030. Quoting tech crunch.
It'll still be a while before quantum computers become powerful enough to do anything useful but it's increasingly likely that we will see full scale error corrected quantum computers become operational within the next five to ten years. That'll be great for scientists trying to solve hard computational problems in chemistry and material science but also for those trying to break the most common encryption schemes used today.
That's because the mathematics of the RSA algorithm that for example keep the internet connection to your bank safe are almost impossible to break with even the most powerful traditional computer. It would take decades to find the right key but these same encryption algorithms are almost trivially easy for a quantum computer to break.
This is given rise to post quantum cryptography algorithms and on Tuesday the US National Institute of Standards and Technology and IST published the first set of standards for post quantum cryptography. MLKEM originally known as Kristall's Kiber, MLDSA previously known as Kristall's Delithium and SLHDSA initially submitted as Sphinx Plus. And for many companies this also means that now is the time to start implementing these algorithms.
The MLKEM algorithm is somewhat similar to the kind of public private encryption methods used today to establish a secure channel between two servers for example. At its core it uses a lattice system and purposely generated errors that researchers say will be very hard to solve even for a quantum computer. MLDSA on the other hand uses a somewhat similar scheme to generate its keys but is all about creating and verifying digital signatures.
SLHDSA is also all about creating digital signatures but is based on a different mathematical foundation to do so. Two of these algorithms, MLKEM and MLDSA originated at IBM which has long been a leader in building quantum computers to learn a bit more about why we need these standards now. I spoke to Dario Gill, the director of research at IBM. He thinks that we will hit a major inflection point around the end of the decade which is when IBM expects to build a fully error corrected system.
That is one that can run for extended periods without the system breaking down and becoming unusable. Then the question is from that point on how many years until you have systems capable of breaking RSA. That's open for debate but suffice to say we're now in the window where you're starting to say all right so somewhere between the end of the decade and 2035 at the latest in that window that it is going to be possible. You're not violating laws of physics and so on he explained.
Gill argues that now is the time for businesses to start considering the implications of what cryptography will look like once RSA is broken. A patient adversary could after all start gathering encrypted data now and then in 10 years use a powerful quantum computer to break that encryption. But he also noted that few businesses and maybe even government institutions are aware of this end quote. Finally today the English Premier League is back starting this weekend and thank God.
Would you believe me if I told you there's a tech angle to that? Wired takes a look at how this season the Premier League is taking the off-size decision out of the hands of Var that hated video referee and technology and it's doing so thanks to a system that literally just uses iPhone cameras quote. Drag and according to genius will initially use at least 28 iPhone cameras at every stadium in the Premier League.
More cameras may be used in certain stadiums throughout the year the company says the system uses the built-in cameras of iPhone 14 models and newer the iPhones are housed in a custom waterproof case adorned with cooling fans that are connected to a power source the team designed mounts that hold up to four iPhones clumped together. Since the iPhones are positioned around the pitch together they capture a constant stream of video from multiple angles.
Camera mounts can be moved to change coverage zones in certain facilities per genius but will typically be stationary during actual play to ensure proper coverage and avoid recalibration needs on the fly. This wealth of visuals apparently gives drag and the ability to track between 7,000 and 10,000 points on each player at all times.
Drag and leverages the ability of iPhones to capture video and ultra high frame rates, navigating tricky instances of occlusion that can obscure the precise kickpoint of the ball. D'Area offers a simple example. Watch some broadcast video of soccer balls being kicked but slow the clips down enough so you watch the action progress frame by frame. You will in many instances miss the kickpoint. D'Area says the kickpoint will be in between two frames of video.
You go from one frame where the ball is not on the foot yet to the next frame and the ball has already left the foot and gone in the other direction. Post broadcast video today is captured at 50 or 60 frames per second. Dragon can capture up to 200 frames per second potentially reducing those gaps between frames by 75%. The initial EPL system will be capped at 100 frames per second to balance latency, accuracy, and cost.
The system can auto detect important impending events such as a possible off-side call and scale up the frame rate of certain cameras temporarily then scale back down when appropriate to save computing power. Relating this automation is Dragon's other key feature, a machine intelligence system running on the back end known internally as object semantic mesh.
Utilizing geniuses years of converting optical basketball data this machine learning program has been trained on common soccer events or situations over several seasons. It's not just capturing movements, it's contextualizing them in real time and in some cases even learning from them.
In the AI community that's not a very novel approach to have this kind of semantic understanding says Dearia, it's not just an image or a representation, but it's actually something you can reason about and you can interrogate. Don't worry about a full takeover from our robot overlords though.
While both EPL and genius decline to provide specifics, some of which including timing are still being determined ahead of Dragon's in season launch, sources familiar with the setup confirmed that humans will make the final decision on all off-side calls with the assistance of these AI tools.
Speaking of soccer, as mentioned before, it's that time of year, the time where I get into fantasy soccer for a few weeks until I inevitably forget to update my team one week at which point I kind of give up. And as I do every year, I have put together a mutant podcast army league you can join if that's your thing, also some sort of new thing called the FPL Challenge. Coats to both are at the bottom of the show notes.
Usually we get about 30 or 40 folks in the league, but I forget to announce who wins every year. If you won last year, make yourself known to me. Thanks a lot to everybody that joins the league, talk to you tomorrow.