... arrived and is here to stay.

Noel Ackerson, a 33-year-old software developer in Washington DC, who has been trialling Google Glass over the past several weeks, claims to have developed his own "common sense" etiquette for Google's new digital headset. 

Glass, which sites a small computer screen above one eye, also features a built-in motion sensor, camera and microphones, acting as an extension of a person's smartphone.

It enables the user to take photos and record videos by touching the side of the device or speaking commands aloud, as well as allowing him/her to give other web users access to the device's camera so they can "see" what the wearer sees. 

Developer Ackerson's self-imposed niceties require him to take Glass off in a public restroom, in a movie theater and in casinos, where having such a device could give him an unfair advantage.

Says Mr Ackerson: "Google Glass has technology that isn't new, and the etiquette we've applied to existing technologies should roll into it." 

Glass-wearers also can use the device to make phone calls, access Google's web search, get turn-by-turn navigation information and receive text messages on the screen, as well as send texts using their voice.

Currently unavailable to the general public, Glass is scheduled to launch some time in 2014.

Read the original unabridged WSJ.com article.

Factual data only is sourced from the original attributed article. The data is then enhanced by additional research and comment.

... $50 billion over the next three to five years. 

The rise of sophisticated wearable technology, such as smart watches, Google Glasses and other accessories, looks to be irresistible.

The report's authors contend that while 'wearables' are “not new,” they are “at an inflection point in market adoption”. The rationale for their conclusion?

Posit the Swiss hi-rollers: "Because there is a growing installed base of smartphones, cost and performance improvements are coming in components. There is more mature software to run them, and there are new business models for them."

Moreover, the wearables market is a lot bigger than investors realise. The authors contend that as of now the 'wearables' market is worth $3bn to $5bn, rising to perhaps $30 billion to $50 billion over the next three to five years.

Read the original unabridged Barrons.com article.

Factual data only is sourced from the original attributed article. The data is then enhanced by additional research and comment.

... a “think tank approach” to their findings, which were unveiled at the FMI's professional development conference in Olando Florida.

During the conference FMI president/ceo Leslie G Sarasin presented an overview of the FMI's future analysis in her address which posited a sobering reality - yet one poised for market possibilities, offering data analytics from interviews with CPG executives and retailers.

Although consumer demand has remained flat, which is modestly disproportionate to the population growth over the past 15-20 years, the industry has witnessed an explosion in its capacity.

Ms Sarasin suggested that retailers will be evaluating alternative ways to address consumers’ need for value, convenience and safe foods by focusing their growth strategies on the overall shopper experience.

Discussing the FMI report's future vision, Sarasin said: “The leaders in our industry kept coming back to three key words to describe the future food retail experience: Personal, Digital and Virtual.”

A broad range of key drivers will determine the success of instore marketing and merchandising programmes over the next decade. Today, price and convenience continue to trump other consumer trends in garnering shopper attention in store.

Outside of health and beauty care and pharmacy, health and wellness–based themes are the third most common platform for displays, behind price-only and snack/meal solutions.

Read the original unabridged Booz.com article.

Factual data only is sourced from the original attributed article. The data is then enhanced by additional research and comment.

... users to send massive data files at a much faster speeds via their mobile devices, “practically without limitation.”

Fifth generation mobile networks (or 5th generation wireless systems) is a term used to denote the next major phase of mobile telecommunications standards beyond the current 4G/IMT-Advanced standards. 

The new technology will primarily appeal to phone-users who routinely send and receiving large amounts of data. With 5G networks, for example, Samsung claims that users will be able to send super-high-definition movie files in a matter of seconds.

The fastest wireless technology currently available – 4G or long-term evolution – has yet to be widely adopted worldwide. According to industry analysts, the next phase for the standard is likely to be a shift to “4.5G” networks.

Meantime, however, many networks still employ 3G.

Aligning itself with a target recently set by the European Union, Samsung has eyes on commercialising 5G technology by 2020.

Earlier this year the EU aannounced a plan to invest €50 million in research to deliver 5G mobile technology by 2020.

According to South Korea's Yonhap News Agency, Samsung has successfully tested its 5G network with 1Gbps speed (potentially up to 10Gbps), and aims to provide service by 2020. 

Factual data only is sourced from the original attributed article. The data is then enhanced by additional research and comment.

... smartphone featuring a screen that enables three-dimensional images without glasses.

Using retina-tracking technology, images on the smartphone seem to float above the screen like a hologram and appear three-dimensional at all angles. Reporting from within the Amazon bunker, staffers claim that spectacle-wearers may be able to navigate through the phone's content by using just their eyes.

Reports the WSJ: "Some elements of Amazon's hardware push have previously become public. Last year, news surfaced about Amazon developing one smartphone. And last month, The Wall Street Journal and other media outlets reported that Amazon also was developing a set-top box for streaming movies and TV shows."

As ever with the canny Bezos behemoth, there's more to this than meets the eye.

With smartphones - 3D or otherwise - Amazon could collect new data on its users via maps, phone-call tracking and app downloads, then offer users shopping recommendations. There is also the potential for new services like mobile payments.

Read the original unabridged WSJ.com article.

Factual data only is sourced from the original attributed article. The data is then enhanced by additional research and comment.

... 'I will never live a day without them'. 

Google's gizmo is a wearable computer with a head-mounted display [HMD] under development by Google's Project Glass research and development project, with the mission of producing a mass-market ubiquitous computer.

Google Glass displays information in a smartphone type hands-free format that interacts with the internet via natural language voice commands.

While the frames do not currently have lenses fitted to them, Google is considering partnering with sunglass retailers such as Ray-Ban and may also open retail stores to allow customers to try out the device.

The Explorer Edition can't be used by people who wear prescription glasses, but Google has confirmed that Glass will eventually work with frames and lenses that match the wearer's prescription.

The glasses will be modular and therefore possibly attachable to normal prescription glasses.

View GoogleGlass video.

Read the original unabridged Geekwire article.

Factual data only is sourced from the original attributed article. The data is then enhanced by additional research and comment.

... convenient, efficacious or suifficiently high-quality to command a premium price.  

Opines Maureen Morrison, writing in today's Advertising Age: "Brands can no longer bide their time, fending off store's own-brand options while waiting and hoping for consumers' wallets to fatten.

"About 40% of the US population is still downtrodden, concerned or otherwise worried about their financial futures, according to IRI [Information Resources Inc] research.

"In addition to convincing consumers, brands may need to perform an even tougher trick: redefining their own definition of value to one that's additive.

"When not reduced to the question of price, value speaks directly to what benefits a product or service adds to a customer's life. Some smart brands get this and are using packaging, design, sourcing strategies and technologies to entice consumers to get them to open their wallet a bit more, even in these tough times."

Conversely, however, the classic example of a recessionary innovation that gets consumers to pay more, not less, is P&G's Tide Pods.

The repackaging of its detergent into one-pack-per-load pellets is a clear boon to the consumer because it eliminates messy measuring.

Research consducted by IRI concluded that P&G's Tide Pods been a breakout hit that rocketed to $500m in stateside sales in about one year.

Better yet, from P&G's viewpoint, the bundle of individual laundry detergent packages comes at a significant premium to liquid Tide - $18.99 for a 66-load container of Pods on Walgreens.com.

Read the original unabridged AdAge article.

Factual data only is sourced from the original attributed article. The data is then enhanced by additional research and comment.

... "the gap between you and the internet totally disappears".

"The computer is responsive in a manner that I've never experienced before. You can play multiple 4k YouTube videos without buffering. You can download files as large as one gigabyte during a TV commercial break. You just get more done."

So why is Google investing megabucks on Fiber? 

Says Walk: "When you play with it, the gap between you and internet totally disappears. The computer is responsive in a manner that I've never experienced before.

What's in it for Google? According to Mr Walk, Fiber will:

• Reset consumer expectations of what a connected home should feel like.
   
• Continue to drive down the cost of deployment and sign up customers for a very sticky (high LTV) service by being first to market.
   
• If existing ISPs follow - or even beat Google in some markets - Google still wins. Why? Because as I found out personally, when the internet is this fast you do one more search per session, watch one more video per session, send one more email per session.
   
• A connected population benefits Google. Period.

Read the original unabridged Business Insider article.

Factual data only is sourced from the original attributed article. The data is then enhanced by additional research and comment.

... on a tablet or large touchscreen. 

The camera and projector forming the system are built into a stand that sits on a tabletop and monitors documents and the fingers of users in front of them.

The cameras spot where fingers are placed and uses software to interpret what people want to do to the map, sticky note, photograph or other paper document.

A projector displays virtual buttons on to the tabletop that people can press with a fingertip to start copying or to perform other actions. The projector also illuminates the sections people want to highlight and projects copies of the text or image they want to grab.

Virtual copies of items can be "stored" to one side of the table and then moved around, expanded, shrunk and manipulated by a user. Fujitsu said the system could be useful for helping to organise notes from meetings or research projects.

One key breakthrough is the use of cameras offset from each other slightly.

This helps the system to get a much better idea of finger movements, enabling it to accurately detect what a user wants to highlight or copy.

Fujitsu said it hoped to release a commercial version of the imaging technology in 2014.

Read the original unabridged BBC article.

Factual data only is sourced from the original attributed article. The data is then enhanced by additional research and comment.

... doesn't require users to hit "record".

Instead algorithms learn what viewers like and recommend new shows. The device also offers easy sync with social networks, effortless co-viewing with friends far away, video on tablets, phones and other screen devices, plus seamless integration of traditional TV and web content.

Hypes AdAge: "Now imagine all of that comes in a beautiful box with a front-facing camera and the kind of industrial design that makes you not want to hide it in a cabinet."

Most significantly, however, the device has progressed far beyond the drawing board. It is built and in the hands of a select few secret testers at media companies, agencies and, of course, Intel's headquarters in Santa Clara, California.

As yet Intel has not announced a name, a price or a release date. However, those who have seen the device describe it as a significant advance over any existing cable or satellite platform.

Group M's Michael Bologna has spent several hours testing the box and declares: "I'm impressed because Intel makes chips [and] no one expected them to come out with a product like this."

Notes AdAge: "Silicon Valley has the best interface designers in the world, but until now efforts to apply that expertise to TV have led to false starts like Google TV and other products such as Apple TV and Xbox Live."

But, stresses the AdAge article, no one expects Intel to become a TV power overnight.

Nontheless, Intel TV represents an interesting challenge for cable and telcos, which as of now do not offer TV service outside their own wired footprint. Each new customer who opts for Intel TV is a customer walking away from the "bundle" of services that cable and telcos sell, among them broadband, TV and phone.

Read the original unabridged AdAge article.

Factual data only is sourced from the original attributed article. The data is then enhanced by additional research and comment.