Five Hot Tech Trends - DTNS WEEKLY TECH UPDATE 08/24/2017

Hi boss. Every so often I like to check in on what the top trends in tech stories  are based on my perch from the daily news gathering seat. That's this week's column. Let me know what you think!

This is the weekly newsletter companion to Daily Tech News Show at http://dailytechnewsshow.com/ 

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CLOSER LOOK - Top 5 Tech Trends

Somebody the other day asked me what I’m most excited about in tech these days. I always have a hard time answering those kinds of questions because so many things excite me. 

But then I started thinking about the fact that phone news has started to seem uneventful. And I have had some conversations with people about whether there’s anything new in tech. 

And of course there is. We’ve been talking about things as news on DTNS lately that would have been science fiction on Buzz Out Loud back in 2007. Here are a few examples.

Robots - There are multiple companies making multiple kinds of robots, from friendly helpers like Pepper, to industrial automatons. The worry about robots has shifted from jokes about them turning on us, to more serious worries that the.y’ll take too many jobs.

Artificial Intelligence - Similarly AI has gone from being a SciFi scare tactic to something causing more than 100 scientists to sign a letter to the UN encouraging the adoption of sensible rules regarding autonomous weapons. Not to mention Elon Musk’s continual campaign to get people to take the risks of AI advancements seriously.

Smart Home - I’m lumping in Internet of Things here too. Automating things around the house has gone from a project for hobbyists to a thing people do accidentally because they bought an Amazon Echo. Everybody’s getting into the smart speaker business (Apple, Samsung) because they think this is the hub for the smart home of the future.

Medical Augmentation - Whether it’s easing the restrictions on hearing aid innovations or new robotic surgical techniques or advances in prosthetics that can communicate wirelessly with the brain, huge advances in medical tech are feeling more consumer-friendly than ever before. 

Self-Driving Cars, Planes, Boats and Drones - Self-driving car services will be a reality in the next few years. We’ll see how good they are and how self-driving but they’re coming. And light plane, cargo ships and trucks are hot on their heels. There are also huge advances in using quadcopters and the likes for deliveries and most of those while supervised fly themselves for most of their routes.

That’s just a few. Let me know which tech trends you’re most excited about in the comments below.

NEWS RECAP

Samsung announced the Galaxy Note 8 . It has a 6.3-inch AMOLED screen with 2960 x 1440 resolution and curved edges. Specs are the expected Snapdragon 835 or Exynos 8895, IP68 water resistance but it adds 6GB of RAM and 3,300mAh battery. It has dual rear wide-angle and telephoto cameras and ships with Android 7.1.1 Nougat and voice assistant Bixby. App Pair will let you create a shortcut that launches two apps at once side by side. US pre-orders in midnight black and orchid gray begin August 24th and the Note 8 arrives September 15. Maple Gold and Deep Sea Blue colors will also be available. Pricing varies by carrier around the $900 range. https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2017/08/samsung-makes-the-galaxy-note8-official/ 

-- https://www.theverge.com/2017/8/23/16189724/samsung-galaxy-note-7-discounts-note-8-unpacked-2017 

Amazon announced its acquisition of Whole Foods will close Monday August 28. Amazon says customers will immediately see lower prices on a selection of best-selling staples across stores. Amazon Prime will become the Whole Foods customer rewards program and eventually Prime members will get ”special savings and in-store benefits” at Whole Foods. https://www.cnbc.com/2017/08/24/amazon-says-whole-foods-deal-will-close-monday-prime-customers-to-immediately-get-discounts.html

At the International Joint Conference on AI in Melbourne this weekend, 115 artificial intelligence and robotics specialists released a signed letter to the United Nations urging the ban of lethal autonomous weapons. Among the signers were Element AI’s Yoshua Bengio, DeepMind founder Mustafa Suleyman, Aldeberan Robotics Jerome Monceaux and the Boring Company’s Elon Musk. https://thenextweb.com/artificial-intelligence/2017/08/21/elon-musk-is-right-we-should-all-be-worried-about-killer-robots/#.tnw_5sxzBs5N 

NuTonomy CEO Karl Iagnemma said Friday he hopes to launch a paid commercial autonomous car service in Singapore by mid-2018 though it could be later in the year. The service would include a human ready to take over driving if needed. NuTonomy has been testing the service in cooperation with Grab in Singapore and plans to launch a test with Lyft in Boston. http://www.reuters.com/article/us-nutonomy-singapore-idUSKCN1AY2IC 

Google announced that Android 8.0, previously referred to as Android O, will officially be called Android Oreo. Oreo is in carrier testing and should arrive soon on the Pixel and Nexus 5X and 6P phones. The Pixel C and Nexus Player will get it after that followed by other devices." http://www.androidpolice.com/2017/08/22/android-oreo-feature-spotlight-traditional-battery-stats-make-return-show-full-device-usage-setting/ 

Evan Blass, AKA Evleaks posted that Google’s new Pixel phones will be announced October 5th and come with Snapdragon 836 processors. Google has not itself announced a date or details. http://www.androidpolice.com/2017/08/23/pixel-2-pixel-2-xl-will-debut-october-5th-snapdragon-836-tow/ 

CrashPlan has begun notifying users it will shut down its consumer backup service and focus solely on small business and enterprise customers. All current CrashPlan subscriptions will be honored until their end date and then given an extra 60 days to migrate. If your subscription ends after October 22, 2018, CrashPlan will convert you to a small business account for the remainder of your subscription. CrashPlan is offering a 50% discount on Carbonite as a referral. https://techcrunch.com/2017/08/22/crashplan-shuts-down-its-popular-cloud-backup-service-to-focus-on-business-customers/ 

US District Court Judge David Hale dismissed with prejudice AT&T’s lawsuit against the city of Louisville over its plans to make it easier for competing ISP’s to gain access to utility poles. The One Touch Make Ready rules allow ISPs to make some wire adjustments without notifying the owner of the wires. Previously competitors would wait months for incumbents to respond to requests to move wires. AT&T owns many of the poles but the judge ruled that Louisville Metro has the right to regulate rights of way in the city. https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2017/08/att-loses-lawsuit-in-which-it-tried-to-thwart-google-fiber-construction/ 

Indian IT firm Infosys’s CEO Vishal Sikka stepped down Friday citing a "continuous drumbeat of distractions" from founders of the company.  Founder and former chairman Narayana Murthy accused the company of lapses in corporate governance in February. The board denied the accusations and criticized Murthy for driving out Sikka. The founders including Murthy  own 12.75 percent of Infosys. https://www.reuters.com/article/us-infosys-ceo-idUSKCN1AY0DH 

Intel announced its first 8th-generation processors, 4 15W U-series mobile processors for laptops. The new processors are refreshed 14-nanometer+ Kaby Lake architecture with a higher top clock speed of 4.2 GHz, four cores and eight threads, that's twice the previous U-series. Intel claims a 40-precent performance boost over the 7th-generation parts. https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2017/08/intel-first-8th-generation-processors-are-just-updated-7th-generation-chips/

"Microsoft opened preorders for the Xbox One X Sunday. The console can handle 4K and sells for $499. A limited version carrying the console’s codename “Project Scorpio” is on sale as well. Microsoft also announced new Minecraft edition of the Xbox One S and a bundle for Middle-Earth Shadow of War. https://techcrunch.com/2017/08/20/microsoft-kicks-off-xbox-one-x-pre-orders-today-with-a-limited-project-scorpio-edition/ 

US mobile carrier Verizon announced its unlimited plan will split into three starting August 23rd. A $75 a month Go Unlimited plan may reduce speed at any time if networks are congested and video is always reduced to 480p on phones and 720p on tablets. Beyond Unlimited is $85 a month and only reduces speed after you have passed 22GB and video is limited to 720p on phones and 1080p on tablets. A Business Unlimited plan is similar to Beyond Unlimited with a higher 25GB threshold before possible slowdowns. Customers on older unlimited plans will see no changes except video being limited to 720p on phones and 1080p on tablets. https://www.theverge.com/2017/8/22/16181362/verizon-new-unlimited-data-plan-video-throttling-net-neutrality 

IBM announced a consortium to explore where the use of blockchain could benefit the food supply chains. IBM’s BlockChain Platform will help companies implement better transparency and tracking. Nestlé, Tyson Foods, Dole, Golden State Foods, Kroger, McCormick and Company,  Unilever and Wal-Mart are members of the consortium. https://techcrunch.com/2017/08/22/ibm-costco-walmart-and-others-team-up-to-improve-food-safety-with-blockchains/ 

Samsung mobile president DJ Koh told CNBC Samsung is working on a smart speaker. Koh added, "Maybe soon we will announce it. I am already working on it." https://www.cnbc.com/2017/08/23/samsung-working-on-smart-speaker-to-rival-amazon-echo-apple-homepod.html