Monthly Archives: August 2017

Is Virtual Reality the Future or Another Disappointing Technology? – Motley Fool

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When Facebook (NASDAQ:FB) bought Oculus in 2014, Samsung released Gear VR in 2015, and HTC released the Vive in 2016, it seemed like the world of virtual reality was upon us. Soon, we would all have VR headsets and we could live in a world of our own with the convenience of being at home. But Oculus Rift, Gear VR, and HTC Vive haven't exactly become household devices, and there are signs companies are starting to realize the disappointment.

Facebook recently lowered the price of its Rift headset from an original $800 to $399 for a short-term sale, ultimately settling on $499 recently. You don't discount a product that's selling like hotcakes, indicating that Oculus's flagship product isn't living up to expectations. According to SuperData, HTC Vive isn't selling much better. Is VR doomed to disappoint, like 3D TV did, or is the industry just setting up for growth?

Image source: Getty Images.

Rather than becoming a big business, VR has thus far been a small hobby for VR companies. According to Venture Beat and data from SuperData, the immersive VR systems of HTC Vive and Oculus Rift are selling fewer than 100,000 units per quarter. And while Gear VR and Alphabet(NASDAQ:GOOG)(NASDAQ:GOOGL)subsidiary Google's Daydream are selling more units, they're less expensive and less advanced and may be given away for free.

Data source: SuperData via VentureBeat.

To attract developers and content creator, hardware companies need to increase adoption rapidly. And they're not doing that today.

The problem with early VR systems is that they're either not powerful enough or so powerful they're difficult to use. Samsung VR uses common Samsung headsets, as does Google Cardboard, which limits their processing power. Sony (NYSE:SNE) Playstation VR requires a console and Oculus Rift and HTV Vive require high-powered computers, which aren't exactly items the average person has in their home today. The hardware dynamic doesn't make VR easy to adopt, even for early adopters.

Compounding the problem facing VR is that content is very limited. There aren't a plethora of immersive games people can spend days playing, like you could do on a console, or video content that would make movies a viable reason to go VR. And this is where we get into the chicken-and-egg challenge VR companies will face going forward.

If there was either amazing hardware or amazing content in VR, it may drag the other along, creating a virtuous cycle of adoption. But hardware isn't amazing yet and content that could attract users hasn't emerged yet.

The two biggest video game content creators haven't even gotten into the game. Activision Blizzardand Electronic Artshave looked into VR, but aren't developing much content yet. EA CEO Andrew Wilson recently said:

People seem to have come to terms of the fact that VR while an unbelievably wonderful innovation for how you consume interactive entertainment and all forms of entertainment for that matter is going to take a couple of years at least to going to get to a point where it is truly a mass-market consumer opportunity.

In other words, content creators think VR will be big someday but not today. And they're not going to take a chance investing on the bleeding edge.

VR is definitely an interesting technology, but hardware costs need to come down and content and quality need to improve to grow the industry. I think the early phase of growth will be in location-based VR, much like arcades were the home of the video game industry in the 1970s. Once computing power catches up, maybe it will make sense for VR to be something everyone has in their home.

The bottom line is that VR just doesn't move the needle for most big companies yet -- and it may not for years to come.

Suzanne Frey, an executive at Alphabet, is a member of The Motley Fools board of directors. Travis Hoium has no position in any stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool owns shares of and recommends ATVI, Alphabet (A shares), Alphabet (C shares), and Facebook. The Motley Fool recommends EA. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.

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Is Virtual Reality the Future or Another Disappointing Technology? - Motley Fool

UPS is training drivers with virtual reality | WTNH Connecticut News – WTNH Connecticut News (press release)

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(CNN) New UPS drivers will have to prove themselves in virtual reality before they can get behind the wheel of one of the companys 10,000-pound trucks.

The delivery company announced Tuesday that it will add virtual reality tests to its driver training program starting next month. UPS expects virtual reality will make its drivers safer and smarter. Its a game-changer for training. Laura Collings, UPS training and development manager, told CNN Tech. Nothing can really replace real-world training, but virtual reality complements it in a way that engages our employees.

During the virtual reality tests, new trainees will experience trips around city environments. Theyll have to identify hazards along the way by shouting out hazard left or hazard right. The virtual reality tests last about three to six minutes.

UPS wants its drivers constantly scanning roadways to be aware of potential trouble ahead. Virtual reality allows UPS to include a heavy dose of hazards in training, that a driver might not otherwise see when practicing in the in real world.

Related Content:Virtual Reality Headsets Should Be Used in Moderation by Children, Doctor Says

For example, in one instance a ball rolls out onto the street ahead of the virtual driver. UPS wants its drivers to immediately watch for a child that may dart into the street to recover it. The drivers are also taught to identify other problems, such as a billboard, tree or building that blocks their view.

With virtual reality, drivers have a chance to learn lessons and make mistakes without doing any damage.

Drivers of UPS package delivery trucks spend a month training. The first week is spent at a driver training center, followed by three weeks in the field shadowing an experienced driver.

UPS drivers used to train by having to identify hazards in virtual environments that were displayed on computer screens. But UPS executives wanted the more immersive experience that virtual reality provided.

The company told CNN it sees additional chances down the road to use virtual reality, such as for training mechanics on how to service an engine.

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6-Point Checklist for Investing in Virtual Reality – Motley Fool

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Virtual Reality (VR) is one of those technologies that's been promised for years, but has -- until recently -- failed to live up to the hype. There's plenty of evidence pointing to a bright future for VR, but investors need to know a few things first -- like how big the market will be, what the risks are, who the key players are, and why they should to play this strategy out over the long term. So, let's take a look at six things you should know before investing in VR.

Grand View Research estimates that that the global VR market will be worth $48.5 billion by 2025.That's the top-end of some estimates and others range from$7.5 billion and $22.5 billion.The VR market was worth just $1.8 billion last year, which means virtual reality is poised for huge growth no matter which estimate is more accurate.

Image source: Getty Images.

VR investors need to keep in mind that this technology will likely need more time to get off the ground, mainly because of virtual reality's expensive hardware costs. Consider that when Facebook's (NASDAQ:FB) Oculus launched its high-end Rift headset. It priced the device at $599 and its Touch controllers at $199. That's a hefty price tag for most consumers and Oculus ended up dropping the price of its VR package twice to its current $399 price tag for both the headset and controllers.

But most consumers still don't have an extra $400 to just spend on VR equipment, and these price points are going to keep mainstream consumers away from high-end VR tech for a while.

Additionally, high-end VR equipment requires lots of processing power to deliver high-quality graphics with low latency (so that the virtual world moves smoothly as a user looks around). NVIDIA Corporation (NASDAQ:NVDA) noted last year that less than 1% of PCs were capable of running high-end VR, and while that percentage has likely gone up this year, investors need to remember that most consumers won't be using high-end virtual reality for many years.

One of the great things about VR investing is that there are several avenues investors can take in order to benefit. If you're interested in chipmakers, then you can invest in NVIDIA, which makes graphics processing units (GPUs) that are the go-to high-end chips that PC makers choose for their graphics processing needs. NVIDIA makes about 53% of its total revenue from the gaming segment (chips for gaming processing), which makes the company a keyer in the VR space.

If you're looking for a solid hardware and software VR play, then there's Alphabet's (NASDAQ:GOOG) (NASDAQ:GOOGL) Google. The company has focused its attention on the mobile VR market, and it's already getting far out ahead of its competition. Google's Cardboard and Daydream View headsets are by the far the best selling mobile VR headsets on the market, accounting for 69% of mobile VR headsets sold last year.

Additionally, the company's Daydream platform -- where users can download more than 100 VR apps -- is one of the first, and only, of its kind. Google is quickly building its mobile VR dominance in the same way it did with Android and is already figuring out how to earn money from VR through advertising.

I've already mentioned Facebook, NVIDIA, and Google, but plenty of other technology companies are looking to virtual reality for more growth. Sony (NYSE:SNE) has an advantage in the console market after the company released its PlayStation VR headset that works on current versions of its PlayStation 4. The company has already sold 60.4 millionPS4s to date and has already sold more than 1 million VR headsets since its launch last October.

The sheer number of PS4 consoles on the market make Sony an attractive VR hardware play, and considering that the company's Game and Network Services segment (which includes its console sales) accounts for the majority of its total revenue,then Sony could certainly benefit if headset sales continue to expand.

Intel (NASDAQ:INTC) has also made several moves indicating that the company wants to be a serious virtual reality player. Most recently, the company has started hiring engineers that can build high-end graphics processors. The company may still be a few years away from fully realizing those ambitions, but in the meantime Intel is working on a VR headset, called Project Alloy, that can has all the internal processing power built into it. This means that the headset doesn't need to be tethered to a PC in order to deliver a high-end VR experience.

One thing VR investors should remember is that many companies that are betting on VR are also making plays in the augmented reality (AR) space as well. Augmented reality is the digital overlay of information onto the real world and its so entwined with VR that investors may end up benefiting from both.

For example, I mentioned earlier that Google is doing quite a lot in VR, it also just relaunched its Google Glass device, which is being tested out by healthcare professionals, factory workers for General Electric, and package distribution for DHL. Because VR and AR share similar tech (like headsets, displays, 3D digital information, and graphics), there'slots of overlap between the two that could end up being a hidden benefit for VR investors. IDC expects the combined total spending for AR/VR products and services to skyrocket from $11.4 billion this year to $215 billion by 2021.

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg has said that VR could take at least five to 10 years to truly take off.It's worth remembering that this timeframe is coming from one of the most forward-thinking tech billionaires of our time. So if Zuckerberg is playing the long game with his company's VR investments, then you can expect that you'll probably have to do the same.

And as with any investment, picking a good VR stock starts with finding a solid business that you can stick with over the long-haul. All of the companies listed above have lots of potential in VR, but none of them are betting on it entirely or even earning significant profits from it right now. Rather, each company is creating a long-term strategy right now so that they can benefit from VR later -- and investors should take a similar approach.

Suzanne Frey, an executive at Alphabet, is a member of The Motley Fool's board of directors. Chris Neiger has no position in any stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool owns shares of and recommends Alphabet (A and C shares), Facebook, and Nvidia. The Motley Fool owns shares of General Electric. The Motley Fool recommends Intel. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.

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6-Point Checklist for Investing in Virtual Reality - Motley Fool

Small business – Telegraph.co.uk

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Most reports on virtual reality tend to focus on gamers battling invisible enemies while wearing VR headsets or hi-tech cinema experiences such as the VR pods coming to iMax cinemas. But the impact of this technology on business could be even more powerful affecting everything from training to sales or even recruitment.

Simon Willies, head of commercial, Currys PC World Business, says: Although frequently touted as the future of entertainment, there is an increasing groundswell of support in the idea of applying VR technology to a wider range of industries. Educational institutions, for example, can use VR to provide students with immersive classroom experiences.

VR makes it possible for engineers and manufacturers to experience their creations before theyre builtMark Miles, managing director, RenderMedia

For retailers, VR could revolutionise the in-store experience and from an e-commerce perspective the potential impact is even bigger, allowing sellers to deliver catalogues and products straight into customers living rooms.

The ability to catapult someone directly into a job means VR is also an extremely effective training tool as well as highly useful for manufacturers, which can use VR headsets to design and show off products in 3D before they need to start making a prototype. It is clear that VR holds a lot of potential for many industries, including these five.

Thomas Cook has been investing in virtual reality in the travel industry, using it to enhance the sales experience, says Jo Allison, behavioural analyst at Canvas8. One in 10 users of the technology at its Bluewater [Kent] store is booking a holiday there and then. A VR helicopter tour of Manhattan boosted revenues for the real thing by 190pc.

For engineers and designers, the technology offers a way to show off goods and services to potential clients something that would have been impossible before.

Imagine a situation where any number of trainee surgeons could be in the room with the consultant performing a procedureAlex Guillen, go-to-market manager, Insight UK

Mark Miles, managing director of VR agency RenderMedia, has already partnered with a number of engineering businesses, including aerospace company Airbus.

He says: VR makes it possible for engineers and manufacturers to experience their creations before theyre built. We have developed applications that allow people in different countries to appear next to one another on an oil rig and interact. It creates that heightened sense of reality.

Estate agents are already using virtual reality to show people round properties, with Rightmove trialling VR tours last year. The technology is also having a huge impact on architecture and even home improvements, with Ikea now trialling VR in stores.

Adam Blaxter, co-founder of the lettings app Rentr, says: In architecture and construction, the ability to turn designs into virtual models is already becoming part of a normal workflow. In residential property we have already seen Ikea coming forwards with virtual makeovers for your home.

VRs most powerful impact may well be on training with the technology already used across a huge range of industries.

Alex Guillen, go-to-market manager at Insight UK, says: Imagine a situation in healthcare where any number of trainee surgeons could be in the room with the consultant performing a procedure. To get multiple people that close to the experience is extremely powerful.

The potential uses of virtual reality may soon transcend all industries and become ubiquitous in all workplaces

And it does not stop there. The Holovet company is already creating 3D guides to animal organs using Microsoft Hololens headsets; Samsung employs virtual reality to train its sales teams in how to deal with customers; firefighters in Britain are already training with Oculus Rift headsets, allowing them to gain experience of hostile and possibly deadly environments; and footballers at Arsenal use Oculus Rift headsets to review their moves on the pitch.

The ability to expose people directly to what it is like to do a job means that VR is also a highly powerful recruiting tool, which is already being used by the British Army.

Nick Terry, of Capita Army Recruitment, says: Virtual reality helps us bring the British Army experience to life for young people. Potential recruits can experience the type of training they might receive, such as the exhilaration of parachute jumping or the skills needed for urban combat training.

The potential uses of virtual reality may soon transcend all industries and become ubiquitous in all workplaces. Ms Allison says that VR headsets can turn the computer desktop into a space that workers can enter.

She says: The app Breakroom lets officers turn their VR headsets into multimonitor systems. The idea is that you can be working anywhere; a beach, a mountain, even space.

This seems great for workers who are sick of being chained to a desk, transporting them to tranquil places free from distraction.

This means that employees could one day hold meetings in virtual environments, allowing them to be anywhere they want, with anyone, regardless of geographical boundaries. It seems the opportunities are indeed endless.

As Europes leading specialist electronics provider, Currys PC World Business is on hand to help you find the right technology for your business. Visit curryspcworldbusiness.co.uk for expert tips on how to transform your business today.

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Virtual Reality, Mental Health and Identity – HuffPost

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An emerging technology and its challenges

As AWE is preparing its second conference in Munich Germany in October, the momentum of its Silicon Valley conference is still percolating.

This year AWE in Silicon Valley was the first conference on AR/VR/MR to give Tech for Good an exclusive focus. There were several talks and panel discussions that dealt exclusively with this emerging theme. As VR/AR/MR are maturing and finding varios use cases, its positive potential in the mental/digital health arena is becoming clearer. Its positive role for the enhancement and support of human connection is evident as well.

VR and AR are unique platforms in the way they affect the brain and the visual networks. The sense of presence, the sense of embodiment that is generated through the activation of specific brain networks makes both AR and VR unique platforms for a wide range of applications. In its ability to generate feelings of empathy, in its ability to work with pain, its possibilities as a support for graceful aging and in its ability to support anxiety and depression therapy it is truly unique and versatile.

The segment on AR/VR for Good at AWE was coordinated by the Virtual World Society which was founded by Tom Furness, the grandfather of VR, as he is affectionally called. The DigitalRaign community converged with VWS to invite producers and consumers for VR for Good to witness its new social outreach program. This outreach program is to further the adoption of an ethical and empowering Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality platform.

One full day was devoted entirely to speakers in the area of VR/AR. Many different aspects of the platforms were examined, as well as shortcomings, technological difficulties and barriers to entry and current as well as future possibilities for building a better world. This is also the core of VWSs mission.

A first snapshot from the two days-

William Barry, (adjunct professor at the University of Notre Dame de Namur and founding director its VR/AR immersive learning support lab) used Glassers five basic human needs (Glasser, W. (2000). Reality therapy in action. New York, NY: Harper & Row) to analyze the difficulties and the barriers to entry existing in trying out Virtual Reality for the first time. The five needs of Glasser are survival, love, power, freedom, fun. Dr Barry examined the reluctance of people to try VR. What were and are the motives for the reluctance to experience an immersive adventure? Dr Barry found in his research that the block revolved around the role of self-identity in the VR world. The questions addressed in his research were:

When people come to VR what is their identity?

Who are we really really anyways? was the question that was brought up in conjunction with the usage of this new technology.

Is ones identity then different once in VR? How is this existential anxiety triggered in Virtual Reality? Where is the actual divide with the real world? Dr Barry found that the Ontological weight of the experiences in VR can actually be added to a persons reality. Besides this people are also free to choose experiences and thus create their own profile and further add to their ontological weight. The question: what part of you do you want to experience?

In conclusion, VR can be used as a tool to meet the basic needs listed by Glasser. The user can explore himself/herself in the context of her/his needs: survival, love, power, freedom, fun. In this way VR can support people in understanding and exploring their very own identity. If we understand who we are as a personality we can also understand how to relate with the world in a connective and constructive manner.

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Virtual Reality, Mental Health and Identity - HuffPost

Social virtual reality startup AltspaceVR may not be dead after all – TechCrunch

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What is dead in VR may never die, perhaps?

Social VR startup AltspaceVR may not be shutting down after all.

The company, which raised more than $15 million in funding from GV, Comcast Ventures and others, announced last month that it was unexpectedly closing its virtual doors after a funding deal fell through at the last second. But oddly, less than a month later, the startup has shared that its not going anywhere thanks to new interest from third parties.

We are now in discussions with third parties to develop a sustainable solution to continue development and growth for the future. We look forward to communicating more as details solidify over the coming weeks and months, a company spokesperson told TechCrunch in an email. The company said it will be revealing more details in the coming weeks and months, AltspaceVR CEO Eric Romo did not offer further details when reached for comment.

For now, the service is available to users thanks to askeleton crew at the startup keeping things going.

Last month Oculus co-founder Palmer Luckey sent a message to his Twitter followers polling them on whether or not he should save the startup.Today, soon after a blog post detailing AltspaceVRs continued operation went live on the companys site, Luckey tweetedout a link to the story.

We have reached out to Palmer Luckey on Twitter for comment.

The startup had initially announced it would be shutting down the social network earlier this month and hosted a large community event to mark the sunsetting, but that day came and went with its CEO latertweeting Im thinking we keep the lights on a little longer. Just in case Sound ok to you?

Its honestly unclear what to make of the sudden shutdown and un-shutdown announcements and whether they were just efforts to grab attention and put together a last minute deal, but it is apparent that AltspaceVR still has their work cut out for them as they look to carve out a niche in a crowded social VR space that still has Facebook to compete with.

The startup has also laid off several of its employees and has shut down the majority of its servers, a source close to the company tells TechCrunch. The company revealed last month that its service had just 35,000 monthly active users, despite its presence on most major VR headsets as well as a desktop web interface.

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Social virtual reality startup AltspaceVR may not be dead after all - TechCrunch

AI creates fictional scenes out of real-life photos – Engadget

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Researcher Qifeng Chen of Stanford and Intel fed his AI system 5,000 photos from German streets. Then, with some human help it can build slightly blurry made-up scenes. The image at the top of this article is a example of the network's output.

To create an image a human needs to tell the AI system what goes where. Put a car here, put a building there, place a tree right there. It's paint by numbers and the system generates a wholly unique scene based on that input.

Chen's AI isn't quite good enough to create photorealistic scenes just yet. It doesn't know enough to fill in all those tiny pixels. It's not going to replace the high-end special effects houses that spend months building a world. But, it could be used to create video game and VR worlds where not everything needs to look perfect in the near future.

Intel plans on showing off the tech at the International Conference on Computer Vision in October.

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AI creates fictional scenes out of real-life photos - Engadget

Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg Exchange Heated Words Over AI. Whose Side Are You On? – Inc.com

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Tech billionaires Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg are engaged in a very public disagreement about the nature of artificial intelligence (machines that can think) and whether it's a boon or bane to society. It's almost as interesting to follow as the Hollywood supercouple-of-the-month's divorce proceedings.

Just kidding. Let's agree that the former is relevant, the latter ridiculous.

Musk has been warning for some time now that AI is "our greatest existential threat" and that we should fear perpetuating a world where machines are smarter than humans.

It's not that he's against AI: Musk has invested in several AI companies "to keep an eye on them." He's even launched his own AI start-up, Neuralink--intended to connect the human brain with computers to someday do mind blowing things like repair cancer lesions and brain injuries (for example).

Musk fears the loss of human control if AI is not very carefully monitored.

Zuckerberg sees things very differently and is apparently frustrated by the fear-mongering. The Facebook chief has made AI a strategic priority for his company. He talks about the advances AI could make in healthcare and self-driving cars, for example.

In a recent Facebook Live session where he was answering a question about Musk's continued warning on AI, the Facebook founder responded, "I think that people who are naysayers and kind of trying to drum up these doomsday scenarios--I just, I don't understand it. I think it's really negative and in some ways I actually think it is pretty irresponsible."

Musk quickly fired back with this tweet:

The debate is sure to continue to volley back and forth in a sort of Wimbledon of the Way Out There.

So, at the risk or Mr. Musk calling me out, I thought I'd try to bring it a bit closer to home so you can track better with the debate and form your own opinion. Here are some of the most commonly cited pros and cons to AI:

So are you more of a Muskie or a Zuckerberger?

Better decide which side you lean towards. Before the machines decide for you.

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Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg Exchange Heated Words Over AI. Whose Side Are You On? - Inc.com

AI Vs. The Narrative of the Robot Job-Stealers – HuffPost

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By Doug Randall, CEO, Protagonist

At a recent meeting with U.S. governors, Elon Musk made some hefty criticisms of artificial intelligence. When an interviewer jokingly asked whether we should be afraid of robots taking our jobs, Musk, not jokingly, replied, AI is a fundamental risk to the existence of human civilization. Those are serious words, from a very influential thinker.

Narratives about AI are buzzing. Some, like Musk, have vocalized concerns over the regulation of AI and its impact on human jobs. The vast majority of industry leaders have been bombastic about the wonders of the technology, while dismissing the criticisms. Eric Schmidt of Alphabet said:

Youd have to convince yourself that a declining workforce and an ever-increasing idle force, the sum of that wont generate more demand. Thats roughly the argument that you have to make. Thats never been truein order to believe its different now, you have to believe that humans are not adaptable, that theyre not creative.

That confidence might not resonate with those who are warier of the threats of AI--a population significant population that is underrepresented in Silicon Valley leadership. Protagonist recently analyzed hundreds of thousands of conversations around AI using our Narrative Analytics platform. Most of what we found was positive techno-friendly Narratives, but there are also very real, deeply held beliefs about AI as a threat to humanity, human jobs and human privacy that need to be addressed.

Most companies in the AI space can readily allow that Narratives like robots will take our jobs or AI is a threat to humanity exist. What they dont know is how much that Narrative rests with their target audience or whether those Narratives are being applied to their own brand. Its often more than they think. Elon Musk is far from alone in his distrust.

As of last year, 10 percent of Americans considered AI a threat to humanity and six percent considered it a threat to jobs, though the former number was declining and the latter was rising. With that in mind, businesses should be aware of the very real risks of being labelled a job-killer. That Narrative might not be as broadly held as some others, but is one of the most emotionally evocative. Fear and anger over outsourced or inaccessible work opportunities played a major role in the last presidential election. Its clearly a topic that resonates with people on a deep level, and if it dictated their vote, it will dictate their feelings about a company.

Our analysis revealed a cautionary finding: the less tech-friendly Narratives about AI have significantly higher levels of engagement than the more positive tropes. That means theyre more likely to spread quickly once they are triggered.

In todays world it doesnt matter whether specific types of AI present a real threat to human jobs or privacy; if theyre perceived to be dangerous the businesses behind them could be in real trouble. Negative affiliations could result in anything from investor slowdown, to active boycotts to slowed adoption during critical growth periods.

In Silicon Valley and tech markets, growth rates are particularly important and AI companies often experience surges of enthusiastic early adopters. When AI companies are strategizing for continued growth and allocating resources, they also need to think about how adoption trends might change when their product reaches the broader market. Negative narratives could create significanteven damningheadwinds if they arent accounted for and addressed directly.

So what can businesses implementing AI do? First, understand the Narrative landscape, then take action by addressing negative beliefs head-on. Of the seven percent of Americans who fear AI is feeding the surveillance machine, most are in finance, marketing or healthcare. So businesses looking to sell into those fields should emphasize privacy in their marketing. Companies worried about being affiliated with job disenfranchisement should advocate ways they create opportunities.

Its okay to relish in the excitement of innovation; 69 percent of the the mentality around artificial intelligence is positive: its rich, its exciting, its transforming business as we know it. AI-using companies can and should participate in that shared glow. They just cant ignore or laugh off those other Narratives as they do so. Especially with people like Musk chiming in.

Dougis Founder & CEO ofProtagonistwhich is a high growth Narrative Analytics company.Protagonistmines beliefs in order to energize brands, win narrative battles, and understand target audiences.

Protagonistuses natural language processing, machine learning, and deep human expertise to identify, measure, and shape narratives.Doughas lectured on a number of topics at the Wharton School, Stanford University, and National Defense University; his articles on future technology trends have appeared in the Financial Times, Wired, and Business 2.0. He was previously a partner at Monitor, founder of Monitor 360 and co-head of the consulting practice at Global Business Network (GBN). Before that, he was a Vice President at Snapfish, a senior consultant at Decision Strategies, Inc., and a senior research fellow at the Wharton School.

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AI Vs. The Narrative of the Robot Job-Stealers - HuffPost

What ON Semiconductor Thinks About the IoT, AI, and the Future of Tech Development – Madison.com

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On Aug. 7, semiconductor, sensor,and integrated circuits makerON Semiconductor (NASDAQ: ON) reported second-quarter 2017 results that exceeded management's guidance. Later in the day, I caught up with ON's David Somo -- the company's vice president of corporate strategy and marketing -- to talk about the industry, where things are headed, and what ON is doing to grow its piece of the pie.

David Somo, ON Semiconductor's senior vice president of corporate strategy and marketing. Image source: ON Semiconductor.

ON Semiconductor is often lumped in with what has been dubbed the Internet of Things (IoT) movement, an oft-used term that has become almost generic. What is it exactly?

At the highest level, Somo defines it as "a way to bridge the physical and digital worlds with intelligent technology." Digging a little deeper, this essentially refers to machines and systems that are aware of their environment and deliver data to help improve our lives.

For ON, the rubber meets the road with the devices themselves, like the companies IoT Development Kit -- a hardware package with supporting software designed to help engineers quickly develop a range of devices from smart-home to industrial applications. The "out-of-the-box ready-to-deploy" system recently won the IoT Evolution Product of the Year award from IoT Evolution magazine.

With so many devices coming online, the industry is all about making development and testing of connected systems a quick process. The easier the kit is to use and the more comprehensive its coverage of the connected industry overall, the more likely an engineer is to do business with ON. Speaking to the importance of this, Somo had this to say:

Asthe market environment and application needs changed, we've evolved our business model to go from components, to modules, to more platforms. We are into systems enablement with the components and modules we offer. As devices become intelligent and need to be connected ... semiconductor companies are stepping up in applications capabilities, and ON Semiconductor is certainly trying to lead in this area to offer an out-of-the-box type of solution for customers to jump-start their development.

ON has been aggressively moving into connected automobiles and other industrial applications in recent years, building out a portfolio of differentiated products to capture more share of client's end systems.

To that end, artificial intelligence (AI) has begun to enter the equation for ON. Another buzzword in the tech industry, Somo defines it simply as a device gathering environmental data, looking for patterns in that data, and continuously learning from those patterns.

Perhaps the most visible part of the AI movement is with digital assistants like the Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN) Echo, but the technology is getting applied mostly outside of consumer markets. Data center management, industrial robotics, and autonomous vehicles are some notable examples, Somo said.

AI is typically the realm of tech companies like Intel (NASDAQ: INTC) and NVIDIA (NASDAQ: NVDA), which provide the processing horsepower, but ON has found that the massive amounts of data being sent to the brain of a system like an autonomous-driving car or an industrial robot affects efficiency.

For example, in an autonomous car, the processor has to continuously parse through and make decisions on information coming from a dozen different sensors, including radar (object detection using radio waves) and lidar (object detection using light imaging) sensors. All that data transfer bogs down not just the main processor, but also the connections in the car carrying the data.

To help speed things up, Somo said, ON is building a single processor unit into its sensors to do some front-end decision making before sending relevant data to the main brain. That helps free up processing power, but more importantly it reduces the amount of bandwidth being consumed in the internal system of the car itself. That helps reduce the lag time as information is sent back and forth from the peripheral device to the brain of the car, a critical process for safety of the vehicle and its passengers.

Image source: Getty Images.

Estimates for the number of connected devices in operation by the end of this decade are all over the board, with some saying as many as 50 billion devices compared to about 8 billion now. Somo said ON tends to think in the 25 billion-to 30 billion-connection range by 2020, but it's almost impossible to say for sure.

The one thing that is for certain is that the opportunity is huge and there is plenty of new business to go around. ON provides a lot of detail on what industries are paying the bills, and currently the automotive and industrial sectors make up just shy of 60% of revenues. I asked Somo if that number will be consistent in the years ahead, or if ON will expand its presence into other areas.

I think automotive and industrial both have long legs under them, thinking about the megatrends that are there. Take automotive, there are four key megatrends, two of which we play in strongly and one we have some play in. The first is autonomous vehicles where you're building higher levels of autonomy ... we have a couple decades of runway to get there in capabilities.

Electric vehicles, we're hearing a lot of noise from companies like Volvo or Subaru, or like Audi and BMW all talking about a healthy percentage of their vehicle fleets are going to be electric motors by 2025.

The third megatrend is connected vehicles. We participate inside the vehicles, so connecting everything inside the vehicle, whether it's wired or wireless like Bluetooth. But there's also outside the vehicle as well, vehicle-to-vehicle, or vehicle-to-grid, and that's going to be more 5G-technology enabled.

The final area is in mobility services around autonomous vehicles. We really aren't quite at that level from an ecosystem vantage point. There is significant competition taking place there ... between the traditional automotive manufacturers andthe ride sharing services like Uber and Lyft, that are competing for how that is going to work over time.

The answer in short isthe company is always looking for new growth opportunities, but likes its current breakdown. Somo sees much connected device growth happening in theindustrial economy for years to come, providing plenty of opportunity.

Even though connected devices are booming, Somo said in ON's view the industry is well-balanced from a supply and demand perspective. Often fraught with periods of boom and bust as supply and demand changes, the company sees things as being neither hot nor cold but just right.Persisting balance betweensupply and demand means steady growth without substantial risk of an industry crash. That's good for all IoT companies, and is a good situation for ON as it continues to expand on its role as a device and connected systems supplier.

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What ON Semiconductor Thinks About the IoT, AI, and the Future of Tech Development - Madison.com

When robots learn to lie, then we worry about AI – The Australian Financial Review

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Beware the hyperbole surrounding artificial intelligence and how far it has progressed.

Great claims are being made for artificial intelligence, or AI, these days.

Amazon's Alexa, Google's assistant, Apple's Siri, Microsoft's Cortana: these are all cited as examples of AI. Yet speech recognition is hardly new: we have seen steady improvements in commercial software like Dragon for 20 years.

Recently we have seen a series of claims that AI, with new breakthroughs like "deep learning", could displace 2 million or more Australian workers from their jobs by 2030.

Similar claims have been made before.

I was fortunate to discuss AI with a philosopher, Julius Kovesi, in the 1970s as I led the team that eventually developed sheep-shearing robots. With great insight, he argued that robots, in essence, were built on similar principles to common toilet cisterns and were nothing more than simple automatons.

"Show me a robot that deliberately tells you a lie to manipulate your behaviour, and then I will accept you have artificial intelligence!" he exclaimed.

That's the last thing we wanted in a sheep-shearing robot, of course.

To understand future prospects, it's helpful to see AI as just another way of programming digital computers. That's all it is, for the time being.

We have been learning to live with computers for many decades. Gradually, we are all becoming more dependent on them and they are getting easier to use. Smartphones are a good example.

Our jobs have changed as a result, and will continue to change.

Smartphones can also disrupt sleep and social lives, but so can many other things too. Therefore, claims that we are now at "a convergence" where AI is going to fundamentally change everything are hard to accept.

We have seen several surges in AI hyperbole. In the 1960s, machine translation of natural language was "just two or three years away". And we still have a long way to go with that one. In the late 1970s and early 1980s, many believed forecasts that 95 per cent of factory jobs would be eliminated by the mid-1990s. And we still have a long way to go with that one too. The "dot com, dot gone" boom of 2001 saw another surge. Disappointment followed each time as claims faded in the light of reality. And it will happen again.

Self-driving cars will soon be on our streets, thanks to decades of painstaking advances in sensor technology, computer hardware and software engineering. They will drive rather slowly at first, but will steadily improve with time. You can call this AI if you like, but it does not change anything fundamental.

The real casualty in all this hysteria is our appreciation of human intelligences ... plural. For artificial intelligence has only replicated performances like masterful game playing and mathematical theorem proving, or even legal and medical deduction. These are performances we associate with intelligent people.

Consider performances easily mastered by people we think of as the least intelligent, like figuring out what is and is not safe to sit on, or telling jokes. Cognitive scientists are still struggling to comprehend how we could begin to replicate these performances.

Even animal intelligence defies us, as we realised when MIT scientists perfected an artificial dog's nose sensitive enough to detect TNT vapour from buried landmines. When tested in a real minefield, this device detected TNT everywhere and the readings appeared to be unrelated to the actual locations of the mines. Yet trained mine detection dogs could locate the mines in a matter of minutes.

To appreciate this in a more familiar setting, imagine a party in a crowded room. One person lights up a cigarette and, to avoid being ostracised, keeps it hidden in an ashtray under a chair. Everyone in the room soon smells the cigarette smoke but no one can sense where it's coming from. Yet a trained dog would find it in seconds.

There is speculation that quantum computers might one day provide a real breakthrough in AI. At the moment, however, experiments with quantum computers are at much the same stage as Alan Turing was when he started tinkering with relays in the 1920s. There's still a long way to go before we will know whether these machines will tell deliberate lies.

In the meantime it might be worth asking whether the current surge of interest in AI is being promoted by companies like Google and Facebook in a deliberate attempt to seduce investors. Then again, it might just be another instance of self-deception group-think.

James Trevelyan is emeritus professor in the School of Mechanical and Chemical Engineering at the University of Western Australia.

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When robots learn to lie, then we worry about AI - The Australian Financial Review

Husband of China’s first cryogenics subject keeps his love and hope … – South China Morning Post

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It has been three months since Gui Jumin's wife Zhan Wenlian became the first Chinese person to be cryogenically frozen. He is convinced that advances in ...
Sci-fi movie in reality: China's first cryonics practice accomplished in Mayecns
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This Company Freezes Your Body So That You Could One Day Be Resurrected – Billionaire BLLNR | Singapore (registration)

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Robert Ettinger, the father of cryogenics, who introduced the concept in 1962.

An estimated 2,500 bodies around the world have been frozen in the hope of some future resurrection.

If you have around US$90,000 to spare and are of a gambling disposition, perhaps your final journey should be to Australia. A company called Southern Cryonics is looking to open a facility in New South Wales this year that will allow its customers to freeze their bodies after death in the hope of one day being resurrected. If it goes ahead, it will make Australia only the third country, after the US and Russia, where such a service is available.

But, especially for those of a futurist bent perhaps, its as valid a thing to do with ones body as burial or cremation. Last year, a terminally ill 14-year-old girl in the UK became the first and only child so far to undergo the cryonic process. This is technically not freezing but vitrification, in which the body is treated with chemicals and chilled to super-cold temperatures so that molecules are locked in place and a solid is formed. An estimated 2,500 bodies around the world are now stored in this condition.

Supporters concede that the technology to revive the infinitely complex interactions between those molecules may never exist, but are nonetheless hopeful, pointing to shifting conceptions of what irreversible death actually is. If, for example, cessation of a heartbeat used to define it, now hearts can be re-started todays corpse may be tomorrows patient. They point to experiments such as that announced last year by 21st Century Medicine, which claimed to have successfully vitrified and recovered an entire mammalian brain for the first time, with the thawed rabbits brain found to have all of its synapses, cell membranes and intracellular structures intact.

SLIDESHOW: Cryostats are insulated tanks for long term patient storage in liquid nitrogen.

Its not just cryonics. Stem-cell research, nano-tech, cloning, the science just keeps plugging away towards a future [of reanimating] that may or may not come to exist, says an upfront Dennis Kowalski, president of the Michigan-based Cryonics Institute. His company was launched just over 40 years ago to provide cryostasis services. Lots of things considered impossible not long ago are possible today, so we just dont know how cryonics will work out. For people who use the service its really a case of theres nothing to lose.

Naturally, not everyone is hopeful that such processes will ever work out for those in the chiller. The problem with cryonics is that the perception of it is largely shaped by companies offering a service based on something completely unproven, says Joo Pedro De Magalhes, biologist and principal investigator into life extension at the University of Liverpool, UK, and co-founder of the UK Cryonics and Cryopreservation Network. Youre talking about a fairly eccentric procedure that only a few people have signed up to and into which little reported research is being done. That said, I think the people providing these services do believe theres a chance it may work one day, although I would have to say theyre optimistic.

But this is not to say that living longer wont, in time, prove possible as a result of some other method; just that arguably this is more likely to be based around preserving a life that has not experienced death, rather than the promise of reanimating one after its demise. The chasm between the two is all the more pronounced given neurosciences still scant ideas as to what consciousness or mind is, let alone how it might be saved and rebooted; would the warmed and reanimated you be the you that died, or a mere simulacrum? Your body may well not be the same: many of those opting for cryo-preservation go for the freezing of just their brains.

Certainly while cryonics specifically may remain a largely unexplored field, Google is now investing in anti-ageing science, an area that, as De Magalhes puts it, now has fewer crackpots and more reputable scientists working in it, with stronger science behind it too. Indeed, as Yuval Noah Harari argues in his best-selling book Homo Deus, humanisms status as contemporary societys new religion of choice, combined with technological advances, makes some form of greatly extended lifespan inevitable for some generation to come. Whether this will be by melding man and machine, by genetic manipulation, by a form of existence in cyberspace or some other fix can only be speculated at, but everything about our civilisations recent development points to it becoming a reality.

Advances in medicine, after all, have greatly extended average longevity over the last century alone. With this has come a shift in perspective that sees death less as the natural end point to a life so much as a process of disease that could, and perhaps should, be tackled like any other disease that threatens existence. De Magalhes points out that for many working in the field it is less about the pursuit of immortality as of improved health.

After all, its not self-evident that we all want to live forever, and there are philosophical arguments for the idea that death is good, that its necessary to appreciate life, he says. But it is self-evident that nobody wants Alzheimers, for example. If you focus on retarding the problems of ageing then inevitably were going to live longer. The longevity we have now isnt normal; its already better than what we had not long ago. Extrapolate that to the future and in a century the length of time we live now might be considered pretty bad. One can envisage a time when we might live, if not forever, then perhaps thousands of years so much longer than we live now that it might feel like forever.

That, naturally, would bring with it profound changes to the way in which we perceive ourselves and to how the world operates and all the more so if living considerably longer became a possibility faster than society was able to inculcate the notion. How would such a long lifespan affect our sense of self? Would institutions and mores such as lifelong marriage and monogamy remain the norm? When would we retire? How would our relationships with the many subsequent generations of our family be shaped? How would population growth be managed? How would such long lives be funded?

Such questions are, for sure, of no concern to those currently in cryostasis. These people tend to be into sci-fi, and into science too, suggests Kowalski, who has signed up himself, his wife and children for cryonic services when the time comes. I think for a lot of them its not necessarily about the fear of death. Its more a fascination with the future. Theyre optimistic about what it will bring. Theyre more Star Trek than Terminator.

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Why Alternative Medicines Should Not Be The Main Treatment For Cancer – Medical Daily

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As alternative medicine becomesmore and more popular to defend against everything from the common cold to depression, researchers at Yale University looked athow effective these nontraditional routesare when it comes to combating cancer. The study included 281 people with breast, prostate, lung and colorectal cancer who tried these alternative options instead of doctor-recommended treatments.

The data was then compared against 560 cancer patients who received conventional treatments. Overall, people who tried the unproven methods were 2.5 times more likely to die. Breast cancer patients were at a five times greater risk of death, while lung cancer patients doubled their chances of not surviving after trying alternative therapies. Those with colorectal cancer were 4.5 times more likely not to beat their cancerwhen forgoing a prescribed treatment.

Dr. Skyler Johnson, oncologist at the Yale School of Medicine and study co-author, wasnt able to identify specific alternative treatments, but sayshis own patients haveused a wide variety of remedies. They could be herbs, botanicals, homeopathy, special diets or energy crystals, which are basically just stones that people believe have healing powers, he told New Scientist.

From the results, it may appear that these atypical treatments work for some patients, however,Johnson says this is likely because some people actually undergo conventional treatments when their conditions worsen,New Scientist explains.

The magazine reports that people who typically pick these nontraditional methods are wealthy and well educated, as medical insurance doesnt extend to experimental options.

Herbs and diets dont sound expensive, but when these things are delivered through providers, they can come with a hefty bill, John Bridgewater, oncologist at University College London Hospital, told the publication. Its a multibillion dollar industry. People pay more out-of-pocket for alternative treatments than they do for standard treatments.

While medical professionals dont recommend using alternative medicine as the primary treatment, some will give the OK when used to counteractthe unpleasant symptoms accompanying cancer. People dealing with anxiety, fatigue, nausea, pain, sleep problems and stress may turn to things like acupuncture as a way of feeling better, reports Mayo Clinic. According to the hospitals website, aromatherapy may provide relief of stress, pain and nausea.

The American Cancer Society explains when these methods are considered complementary and alternative. We call these complementary because they are used along with your medical treatment. You may sometimes hear them when discussing methods that claim to prevent, diagnose, or treat cancer. We call these alternative because they are used instead of proven medical treatments, the organization writes on its site.

However, the organization also points out, The choice to use complementary or alternative methods is yours, offering a list of items cancer patients should consider before choosing their treatment plan, including not giving up proven treatments for those that havebeen disproven.

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Why Alternative Medicines Should Not Be The Main Treatment For Cancer - Medical Daily

‘Alternative cancer therapies’ may increase your risk of death – NHS Choices

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Wednesday August 16 2017

Theres no evidence alternative treatments alone cure cancer

"Cancer patients who use alternative medicine more than twice as likely to die," is the stark message from The Independent. Researchers found that people who chose alternative medicine instead of conventional cancer treatments were much less likely to survive for at least five years.

Conventional treatments included surgery, radiotherapy,chemotherapy or hormone treatments. The research only applies to people who choose not to have conventional treatments.

Overall, 78% of people having conventional treatment for cancer survived at least five years, compared to only 55% of people having alternative treatment alone. The difference was biggest for breast cancer, where people who chose alternative therapies were more than five times as likely to die within five years as those who chose conventional treatments.

Because this is an observational study, we don't know if other factors might have affected people's survival chances, as well as treatment choice. However, treatment choice seems the most likely explanation.

There are reports that some people find complementary treatments of benefit during cancer treatments. For example, some people have said thatacupuncture helped them cope better with the side effects of chemotherapy.

But importantly, the emphasis is very much on the "complementary" and not on the "alternative". Ignoring medical advice on the treatment choices that potentially offer the most benefit couldprove fatal.

The study was carried out by researchers from Yale School of Medicine. No funding information was provided. Two of the four researchers had received previous grants from companies involved in conventional cancer treatments, and one received research funding from the organisation 21st Century Oncology.

The study was published in thepeer-reviewed Journal of the National Cancer Institute as a "brief communication", meaning not all the study data was published. Some additional data is published online.

Most of the UK media ran reasonably accurate and balanced stories. Several notably the Mail Online and The Sun speculated on the types of alternative therapy people might have been using.

For example, the Mail said: "Breast cancer patients are 5.68 times more at risk if they opt for homeopathy." However, the researchers did not record the alternative therapies used, so we don't know whether homeopathy was one of them.

The Mail also refers to "herbs, botanicals, diets or energy crystals." While these are sometimes promoted as alternative treatments for cancer, again, we don't know which of them were used by people in this study.

This was an observational case control study. This means researchers identified people with cancer who chose to use alternative therapies (cases) and compared their outcomes with those of people with cancer who chose conventional treatments (controls).

The controls were matched as far as possible with each case based on age, sex, demographics and type of cancer. Observational studies can show trends and links between factors (in this case between type of treatment and length of survival after cancer diagnosis) but cannot prove that one causes the other.

Researchers used data from the US National Cancer Database to identify patients with breast, lung, colorectal or prostate cancer, who opted not to receive conventional cancer therapies, but were recorded as having had "other-unproven cancer treatments administered by non-medical personnel."

These patients were matched with two patients with the same type of cancer, who were similar in other ways, but had opted for conventional treatment. Researchers then looked to see how many people lived for at least five years, comparing those who chose alternative therapies with those who chose conventional cancer treatments.

Researchers only included people who had cancer that had not yet spread from the initial site. This type of cancer is usually treatable by conventional treatments They also excluded people with stage 4 (advanced) cancer, those whose treatment was intended to be palliative rather than curative, and people whose treatment was unknown.

Researchers found 281 people who matched the criteria and who had opted for alternative therapy only. Of these, 280 were matched to 560 people with the same cancer, who chose conventional cancer treatments.

To minimise the effect of confounding factors researchers matched people in the study using these criteria:

In addition, when calculating relative chances of surviving five years, the researchers adjusted their figures to account for the effects of medical and demographic factors.

Researchers found that people choosing alternative therapies were more likely to be younger, female, have fewer other ailments, a higher cancer stage, a higher income and education level.

Taking all types of cancer together:

The type of cancer made a difference, though. This is probably because some cancers can kill quickly without treatment, and treatment is very effective. We can see this in the breast cancer results:

However, for prostate cancer, it made little difference whether people opted for conventional treatment (91.5% lived for at least five years) or alternative treatment (86.2% lived for at least five years).

This is probably because prostate cancer usually grows very slowly in the early stages so few people die.

For the first five to 10 years, there's little difference in those who have conventional treatments and those who have their prostate cancer monitored, with no treatment unless it starts to grow. So, you would not expect to see a difference in a five year study.

The researchers said: "We found that cancer patients who initially chose treatment with alternative medicine without conventional cancer treatment were more likely to die."

They added: "Improved communication between patients and caregivers, and greater scrutiny of use of alternative medicine for initial treatment of cancer is needed."

The results and conclusions of this study are clear: people who choose conventional treatments for cancer (such as surgery, radiotherapy, chemotherapy and hormone treatments) are likely to live longer than those who choose alternative medicine only.

It's rare for people to choose to ignore conventional treatment completely when faced with a cancer diagnosis. More often, people choose to add complementary therapies to their conventional cancer treatment. This study doesn't apply to people combining conventional and complementary therapies.

There are some limitations to the study to be aware of:

People who are diagnosed with cancer and want the best chance of surviving should choose conventional cancer therapies. These give the best chance of helping people with cancer to live longer lives.

Complementary therapies such as acupuncture and tai chi may help some people but they should never take the place of potentially life-saving treatments such as chemotherapy, surgery and radiotherapy.

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'Alternative cancer therapies' may increase your risk of death - NHS Choices

ThermoLife Announces Successful New Dietary Ingredient Notification for Creatine Nitrate – Markets Insider

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PHOENIX, Aug. 17, 2017 /PRNewswire/ --ThermoLife International, LLC, a world leader in nitrate technology with a global portfolio of 27 patents that includes more than 450 valid and issued claims relating to the use of nitrates in dietary supplements, has announced its successful submission of a New Dietary Ingredient Notification (NDIN) for Creatine nitrate (CreN) with the FDA.

ThermoLife's patented CreN is licensed by some of the most reputable and successful sports nutrition companies in the world including Nutrabolt, a globally recognized leader in sports nutrition whose brand portfolio includes the award winning Cellucor brand of dietary supplements. Invented by ThermoLife, CreN is a highly soluble and advanced form of creatine that delivers the dual functionality benefits of creatine and dietary nitrates. ThermoLife developed CreN and its other amino acid nitrate ingredients to offer consumers the health and performance benefits of nitrates while at the same time improving upon the physiological properties of creatine and other amino acids. These improvements include vast enhancements in solubility, stability, and dissolution.

Ron Kramer, the President and CEO of ThermoLife said, "ThermoLife's patented CreN is prominently featured in some of the world's best-selling and most effective dietary supplements including Cellucor's C4--the uncontested industry leader in pre-workout supplementation--and the soon to be released Muscle Beach Nutrition brand of Sports Nutrition Products."

On April 28, 2017, ThermoLife received a letter from the FDA acknowledging receipt of its NDIN for CreN without objection. Although ThermoLife has long contended that CreN is exempt from the NDIN process, this notification and acknowledgment further supports the self-affirmed GRAS status that ThermoLife has relied upon to market CreN as a safe and compliant dietary ingredient.

Daniel Fabricant, Ph.D., thePresidentand CEO of the Natural Products Association (NPA) and the former Director of the Division of DietarySupplement Programs at the FDA, said, "The NDI notification process is an important part of the regulatory systemand we've always encouragedall ofour member companies to submit NDINs, even if they believe their NDI is exempt. I applaud ThermoLife, a NPA member, for working with the agency and submitting a notification for CreNconsistent with the statute and regulations."

Prominent food and drug law attorney, A. Wes Siegner, Jr., a partner at Hyman, Phelps & McNamara, P.C. said, "The Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act has strict standards for the safety of dietary ingredients in dietary supplements, as well as for the safety of ingredients in conventional foods. CreN has been assessed by food safety experts and determined to be safe under both the dietary supplement and conventional food standards. In addition, the dissociation products of CreN, creatine and nitrate, have a long history of safe use in both dietary supplements and conventional foods. FDA has been notified as to the scientific basis for safety of CreN as a dietary ingredient, and has acknowledged ThermoLife's notification. Therefore, under federal law, any company that has licensed CreN from ThermoLife may legally market CreN in any dietary supplement. Marketing the ingredient is compliant regardless of the amount or dose of CreN in the dietary supplement, as long as the company has a scientific basis to support the safety of the dose that is recommended."

Nutrabolt has conducted several human clinical studies on CreN and products containing CreN, in a variety of dosages and dosage forms. The studies were conducted at the prestigious Texas A&M University and demonstrated the efficacy, safety and performance benefits of the ingredient.

About ThermoLife International, LLC

Founded in 1998, ThermoLife is a world leader in patented ingredients and technology for use in dietary supplements, specializing in nitrate technology. ThermoLife has a global patent portfolio of 27 patents spanning more than 15 countries including more than 450 valid and issued claims on the use of nitrates in dietary supplements. ThermoLife collaborates with leading manufacturers in the sports nutrition and supplement industry to provide support, innovation, and only the purest, most effective, and innovative ingredients in order to help its customers offer superior patent protected products to end users. http://www.NO3-T.com

About Nutrabolt

Nutrabolt is a global nutritional life sciences company established in 2002 that specializes in consumer product solutions in sports nutrition and functional foods. The Company's marquee brands, Cellucor and Scivation, include some of the industry's most notable product lines C4 and Xtend, which have become uncontested category leaders in pre-workout and intra/post-workout recovery supplementation respectively. Nutrabolt entered the functional food category in 2016 through its FitJoy branded line of healthy on-the-go protein based snacks. Nutrabolt's brands are distributed to some of the world's largest specialty, big box and online retailers including GNC, Vitamin Shoppe, Amazon.com, Bodybuilding.com, Walmart, Costco, and Target. Nutrabolt's brands are sold in more than 75 countries through its network of global distributors. http://www.nutrabolt.com

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ThermoLife Announces Successful New Dietary Ingredient Notification for Creatine Nitrate - Markets Insider

Health & Wellness: 3 easy ways to prevent kidney stones – Montrose Daily Press

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It can strike anyone, at any time. And the pain ranks right up there next to, say, drinking fire or having your legs gnawed off by wild animals.

Its a kidney stone.

And for the over half a million Americans who experience this unpleasant ordeal every year, it spans days of excruciating pain. Statistics show one in 10 of us will suffer from kidney stones at some point in our lives. But what is a kidney stone, and how can we prevent them from forming?

What is a kidney stone?

Kidney stones are comprised of minerals (most often calcium and oxalate deposits) that are collected from the bloodstream. Its not uncommon for stones to remain in the kidneys for a time, but the moment they start to move around and make their way through the ureter which connects the kidney to the bladder look out!

Kidney stones are becoming more prevalent in our senior population and create unique concerns for those caring for them, says Marissa Tan, director of nursing at French Park Care Center. But our focus is on prevention. By monitoring medications for possible side effects that increase the incidence of kidney or bladder stones, and encouraging a balanced diet with plenty of water, magnesium, and vitamin E-rich foods, and daily exercise, we are working to reduce the risks of nephrolithiasis.

Fortunately, improved surgical methods are less invasive and require less recovery time, but before you consider surgery, here are three strategies that prevent and treat painful kidney stones:

1. Stay hydrated.

Most Americans arent drinking enough water, and that creates the perfect breeding ground for kidney stones. Doctors say an active kidney is a healthy kidney, and that means producing at least two liters of urine each day to ensure your kidneys are regularly flushed and functioning properly.

2. Monitor your diet.

The best prevention is a diet high in citrates and low in oxalates. Surprisingly, some popular health foods such as spinach, avocado, beans, nuts, wheat and potatoes, are high in oxalates. So, add foods rich in vitamin E and magnesium like kale, cauliflower, peppers, sunflower seeds, corn, fish, grapes, berries and cabbage. Also, reduce the amount of salt and animal proteins in your diet.

By minimizing the amount of protein or meat as well as salt, stones are less likely to form, says University of Utah Health Care.

To build up citrates and improve bicarbonate levels that keep the bodys pH levels in balance and reduce the risks of kidney stones, Kalani Raphael, MD, a nephrologist at University of Utah Health, suggests eating fruits and vegetables high in citric acid, which prevents stone formation and breaks down stones that have already formed. For example, drinking an 8-ounce glass of water with the juice and grated peel of a fresh lemon can help break down calcium deposits that adhere to oxalates to form stones. When life hands you lemons, a daily dose of foods high in citric acid is great for overall kidney health.

3. Look at medications and supplements.

Kidney stones are often caused by medications or supplements. For example, some medications used to treat heartburn, acid reflux, or ulcers have been linked to higher incidences of kidney stones, so its important to talk with your doctor about the risks.

As for supplements, experts say using a food source rather than relying on a supplement is the best way to get essential vitamins and minerals.

With the exception of vitamin D, we can get adequate supplies of nutrients from eating a balanced diet, says Lydia Ramsey.

And as the debate between the merits or deficiencies rage concerning supplements and the increased risk of kidney stones, Michael Greger, MD, author of How Not to Die, points out that the nice thing about a healthier diet is that there are only good side effects.

If you have partnered dietary supplements with prescribed or over-the-counter medications, its important to discuss those supplements with your doctor.

Lets face it. Dealing with painful kidney stones ranks right up there with giving birth or getting shot out of a circus cannon. But with proper hydration, medication, and diet, you can prevent kidney stones and enjoy overall kidney health.

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Final Defenders trailer gives us the best kind of villain – Ars Technica

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This is the final trailer for Defenders, which hits Netflix tomorrow.

The long-awaited Neflix series Defenders premieres tomorrow, bringing together Daredevil, Jessica Jones, Luke Cage, and Iron Fistall of whom have already starred in their own series for the streaming network. The final Defenders trailer teases us with our longest look yet at bad guy Alexandra (Sigourney Weaver). And she's just the right kind of evil.

In the other previews for the series, we've already seen the dynamic between the Defenders is shaky at best. Jessica and Luke are still pissed at each other, Daredevil likes to work alone, and everybody is making fun of poor Iron Fist. We've heard some funny one-liners zipping among our heroes and the repeated refrain that they are not, definitely not, a team. But they're going to have to become one to defeat Alexandra.

Weaver plays Alexandra as smooth, cool, and in control. We know almost nothing about her because she's not from the Marvel comics, so she has been created just for this show. Based on the trailers, she appears to be some kind of corporate overlord, bringing violent new meaning to "hostile takeover." She's also a master manipulator, trying to bring the Defenders over to her side (she's already working with Elektra). "We're not so different," she coos to them in a previous trailer. "We fight to get back what was once ours."

When it comes to sorting out who Alexandra is, I'm especially curious about one line in the new trailer. When the Defenders ask what she wants, Alexandra says, "The same thing I've always wanted. To bring light into the dark. To bring life where there is death." It makes me wonder whether she's a figure like the biotech corporate maniac Lucy Mirando (Tilda Swinton) in the recent Netflix film Okja. Is she working on some kind of life-extension tech, or is she after something that will create more people like the inexplicably strong Jessica and Luke?

I also think it's crucial that Alexandra be a fascinating, charismatic villain. One of the best parts of Luke Cage was the way Mariah became such an amoral mastermind, despite having the seemingly benign goal of elevating the people of Harlem. Alexandra wants to do good things for humanity, too, or so it seems. We have plenty of villains like Thanos, who are tautologically evil (bad because bad). I'd always rather watch a bad guy who has done the dark psychological work of twisting her worthy ideals into something horrific.

Can't wait to binge on this series over the weekend.

Listing image by Netflix

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Final Defenders trailer gives us the best kind of villain - Ars Technica

Extension agents are neighbors you should get to know – The Garden City Telegram

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Ive been proud to call Hays home for more than five years now. My husband and I moved to Hays in early 2012 for my job as the Extension family and consumer sciences agent at the Ellis County Extension Office.

"Wait what? Where? Whats Extension?"

If youre not as familiar with K-State Research and Extension (as I think you ought to be), youre not alone. Many people ask who we are and what we do. Weve even received mistaken phone calls from folks trying to get an extension on their court date or taxes.

So, let me try to answer the question Whats Extension? and tell you why your local Extension agents are neighbors you should get to know.

K-State Research and Extension is devoted to helping people live healthy and successful lives; it's part of Kansas State University's three-fold mission and traces back to why and how K-State was created as the states land grant university.

Federal legislation in 1862 granted land to states for the creation of institutions that could give working-class citizens in rural areas equal access to higher education, something formerly only available to wealthy families in eastern cities. Kansas State University was founded in 1863 as the nations first land grant university to provide on-campus teaching, research and outreach to Kansas citizens. In 1914, another law created the Cooperative Extension Service which placed educators in the 3,000-plus counties of America to extend practical, research-based information from the land grant university right to the people. It is this outreach mission which makes land grant universities such as K-State unique.

In Kansas, we are fortunate to have a great alliance with county government to support K-State Research and Extension. Federal and state funds come into Kansas State University to support the framework, administration and specialists of K-State Research and Extension. Mostly county funds, with shared state input, support the local Extension offices.

Extension in each county works to meet local needs. Extension agents live in local communities, share concerns about local issues and have a stake in local success. Locally elected citizens serve on boards and committees to guide and oversee our efforts. While Extension programs might vary from county to county, all are designed to provide reliable, research-based education to help individuals, families, farms, businesses and communities solve problems, develop skills and build a better future.

On July 1, following a trend of 45 counties before us, Ellis County and Barton County joined their Extension programs together to form the Cottonwood Extension District, the 17th Extension district in Kansas. The district allows for operational efficiencies as well as agent specialization, which will reduce duplication and give more in-depth focus and expertise for local programming. Agents will continue to office in their local counties and will provide educational programming in both counties. You now will have access to the seven agents of the Cottonwood Extension District for more specialized service.

The wide selection of Exension education and services is easy for Kansans to obtain; after all, we're located nearby. K-State Research and Extension is the front door to information from Kansas State University. Agents have access to the knowledge, experience and expertise of a statewide network of Extension specialists and researchers on the cutting edge of scientific knowledge all of whom share the goal of improving the quality of life of all Kansans, including you.

So I encourage you to get to know the personnel, programs and resources of K-State Research and the Cottonwood Extension District. Our local office is located at 601 Main, Suite A, in downtown Hays. We currently have three Extension agents on staff in the Hays office (and an opening in the Horticulture position while we recruit a new agent) with three agents in the Great Bend office and we are all considered K-State faculty.

We provide low- or no-cost educational programs that are open to the public, serve as speakers at clubs, organizations and schools, do one-on-one consultation on individual issues and share information through print, broadcast and social media. You can connect with the services and resources we offer by calling our Hays office at (785) 628-9430, receiving our quarterly email newsletter, visiting our website at http://www.cottonwood.ksu.edu, liking our Facebook page, currently at K-State Research and Extension Ellis County or following us in the media.

Were here to extend information from our state and partner experts to the people of Ellis and Barton counties to help you have a better life.

Linda K. Beech is a Cottonwood District Extension agent for family and consumer sciences.

Originally posted here:

Extension agents are neighbors you should get to know - The Garden City Telegram

Garden to Grill program teaches youth skills to last a lifetime – Journal Review

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This spring and summer, the Purdue Extension Montgomery County office offered the first Garden to Grill SPARK club for youth in grades 3-12. The goal of this program was to teach youth about the daily care and maintenance that a garden requires to be productive and healthy. Furthermore, youth learned how to cook many of the vegetables grown on the grill as a healthy dinner or snack option. So what is a SPARK club? A SPARK club is a 4-H club that is subject-specific and is designed to SPARK interest in various fields. Youth do not have to be 4-H members to register to participate in a SPARK Club, but will become 4-H members with their payment of the $15.00 State program fee

This six-week program introduced youth to a variety of topics such as plant biology, human nutrition, pest management, food safety, culinary skills, and STEM! Each week youth were responsible for pulling weeds, watering if needed, harvesting ripe vegetables, and preparing their own snack for the day.

After being actively involved in Garden to Grill, 100% of youth reported that they would consume more healthy foods such as vegetables, fruits, whole grains, fat-free or low-fat milk and milk products, seafood, lean meats and poultry, eggs, beans and peas, and nuts and seeds. Furthermore, 87.5% of youth reported that they will follow healthy eating patterns such as: eating breakfast, eating as a family, making healthy snack choices, etc. 100% of the youth also reported that they will consume less unhealthy foods such as: sodium, solid fats, added sugars, and refined grains.

Not only were youth engaged in a hands-on, exciting, and educational program; but they also gained life skills that will help them make healthier choices in the future. The Garden to Grill program also helps youth discover their passion for gardening and/or cooking. This could potentially lead to future careers in these areas or develop a new hobby.

The Purdue Extension Montgomery County office looks forward to holding this program again in the future. If you would like to read more about Garden to Grill and to see pictures from our last session, please visit https://purdueag.exposure.co/from-the-garden-to-the-grill-in-montgomery-county. If you have any questions please contact the Montgomery County Extension office at (765)364-6363.

Abby Sweet is the Montgomery County Extension Education, 4-H Youth Development Educator. The office is at 400 Parke Ave., Crawfordsville. She may be reached by email at asweet@purdue.edu or call 765-364-6363.

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Garden to Grill program teaches youth skills to last a lifetime - Journal Review