ICT Innovatie

Innoveren kan net dat verschil maken tussen iets nieuws leren en iets ouds verkeerd doen. Innovatie is kennis op IT gebied vergroten.

The iconic Winamp media player has fulfilled a promise made in May to go open-source and has now published its complete source code on GitHub. [...]

Winamp wordt open source, biedt nieuwe mogelijkheden voor mediaspeler

In een tijdperk waarin technologie voortdurend evolueert, blijft de nostalgie voor klassieke software zoals Winamp sterk aanwezig. Deze…

 Samsung is likely to announce three new mobile devices this week, the Galaxy S24 FE, Tab S10 Plus, and Tab S10 Ultra. Now we know what each of these will cost.

Samsung presenteert prijzen voor Galaxy S24 FE en Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra

Samsung staat op het punt om deze week drie nieuwe mobiele apparaten aan te kondigen: de Galaxy S24…

 Among the best OLED TV deals are popular brands like LG, Samsung, and Sony, and we've rounded them all up for your saving pleasure.

OLED TV-modellen ontvangen prijsverlagingen bij retailers

Het vinden van de perfecte OLED TV kan een uitdaging zijn, vooral met zoveel opties en prijzen op…

 Molmo, the new multimodal AI model from the non-profit Allen Institute for AI, correctly points to the ketchup bottle in a refrigerator door. (GeekWire Photo / Todd Bishop, screenshot from Ai2 demo site.) Turing Test? Whatever. Meet the Refrigerator Challenge. A new multimodal artificial intelligence model from the Allen Institute for AI (Ai2), works with visual data in novel ways. It can analyze and describe images, like other AI models, but it goes further by pointing to different parts of the image — annotating them with glowing pink dots. It’s called “Molmo,” and it’s actually four models, ranging in size from 1 billion to 72 billion parameters. Leaders of the Seattle-based AI nonprofit say Molmo shows the power of an open approach to AI, proves the value of high-quality training data, and unlocks new capabilities for AI agents, robots, and augmented and virtual reality. But after getting access to the Molmo demo site in advance of its unveiling Wednesday morning, I decided to test the technology on another frontier — my family fridge — challenging the AI with a task known to stump certain humans. In an impressive display of visual perception, Molmo pointed correctly to the ketchup in my refrigerator door, as shown in the image above, despite the plastic bottle being turned around. It also found the lettuce and grapes in the drawers, the yogurt on the first and second shelves, and the package of chicken. For the record, Molmo wasn’t able to find the bottle of beer tucked into the back of the lowest shelf, despite the “Modelo” label being just barely visible in the image. Hey, I can empathize. We’ve all got room for improvement. Household tech tests aside, there’s a lot going on behind the scenes. Ai2 uses an open approach to artificial intelligence — releasing its training data, annotations, underlying code, model weights, and other data for researchers and developers to understand and use themselves. This contrasts with the proprietary approach from companies such as OpenAI, Google, Anthropic, and others. Ai2 graphic. Click to enlarge. Ai2 CEO Ali Farhadi, speaking with reporters Tuesday at the nonprofit’s headquarters north of Lake Union in Seattle, said Molmo shows that open models can now rival proprietary alternatives on key performance benchmarks. While cautioning that he’s not a fan of these benchmarks, due to what he described as scientific flaws, Farhadi acknowledged that they are widely used in the industry, and he showed them to make a larger point. “Open and closed are getting very, very close together,” he said. Ai2 graphic. Click to enlarge. In addition, smaller models are performing on par with larger models. For example, a lightweight version of Molmo with 1 billion parameters performs as well as the 12 billion parameter Pixtral 12B model released last week by Mistral AI, the French AI startup in which Microsoft invested earlier this year. The smaller size is “a key enabler, because now you could start having these things run on your phone, on your wearables, on your desktop, on your laptop, and that just expands the footprint of what these models can do,” Farhadi said. Ai2 says its largest Molmo 72B model likewise compares favorably with OpenAI’s GPT-4V, Anthropic’s Claude 3.5, and Google’s Gemini 1.5. The unveiling of Molmo comes in advance of the Meta Connect conference on Wednesday, where the Facebook parent company is expected to show the latest version of its open-source Llama large-language model. A key differentiator with Molmo, Farhadi explained, is Ai2’s focus on high-quality, curated data. Rather than relying on large, noisy, web-crawled datasets, Momo was trained on a smaller but higher quality dataset, using careful human annotations. This improves the model’s accuracy and reliability. In demos at Ai2 this week, Lead Researcher Matt Deitke showed Molmo’s ability to identify seemingly every detail in a picture of the bustling entrance to Pike Place Market in Seattle, and to identify and count the number of dogs in a photo. Molmo was even able to count the number of dogs with their tongues out. Another notable (if symbolic) breakthrough: Molmo can tell time from a traditional clock face, something that other AI models have struggled to do. Molmo’s visual recognition capabilities also include the ability to read web pages, which creates the possibility for developers to use the model to create new forms of autonomous AI agents. An Ai2 highlight video (above) includes an AI agent that browses the Starbucks website and places a coffee order, for example. Ai2 CEO Ali Farhadi in his office earlier this year at the nonprofit’s Seattle HQ. (GeekWire Photo / Todd Bishop) Ai2, founded by the late Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, has been led for more than a year by Farhadi. He previously founded and led Ai2 spinout Xnor.ai as CEO, and sold it to Apple in 2020 in an estimated $200 million deal that represents one of the institute’s biggest commercial successes to date. Farhadi rejoined Ai2 in July 2023, after leading Apple’s machine learning initiatives. The institute released its Open Language Model, or OLMo, in February last year, part of a larger effort to bring more transparency to the rise of generative AI models. OLMo won Innovation of the Year at the 2024 GeekWire Awards. As a nonprofit AI research institute, Ai2 doesn’t focus on developing products of its own, but instead seeks AI breakthroughs that serve society, and offers its technology for others to use and learn from. However, with the Molmo demo site, Ai2 is taking a more public approach this time, seeking to bring new attention to the technology, to help serve its mission. “This is the first time we’re also putting a live demo out,” Farhadi said, acknowledging some angst. “We did the best we could to make sure that it’s safe, and it doesn’t do weird things. But with these kind of models, you never know what’s going to happen. This is an experiment for us to see and learn if this strategy works or not.”

CogniTech Solutions introduceert Refrigerator Challenge voor AI-evaluatie

Een nieuwe multimodale kunstmatige intelligentie model van het Allen Institute for AI (Ai2) werkt op innovatieve manieren met…

 Smartsheet went public in 2018. Now the company is going private again. (Smartsheet Photo) Smartsheet is allowed to solicit other potential acquirers after announcing a $8.4 billion buyout deal with Blackstone and Vista Equity Partners on Tuesday. But analysts say the existing offer is likely to make it through, according to reporting from Seeking Alpha. The all-cash acquisition will make Smartsheet a private company again, six years after the Bellevue, Wash.-based enterprise software company went public. The $8.4 billion purchase price ($56.50 per share) represents a premium of about 41% to the volume weighted average closing price of Smartsheet stock for the 90 trading days ending July 17, before a report from Reuters on the potential deal. The “go-shop” period to explore other deal offers ends Nov. 8. Analysts told Seeking Alpha that other tech giants — including Amazon, Google, Zoom, and Oracle — could make sense as buyers, as well as other private equity firms. But a larger offer is “unlikely to emerge,” according to The Wall Street Journal. The Journal also noted that the deal could be a bellwether for other software buyouts. M&A activity has slowed in the past few years amid higher interest rates, creating “pent-up demand (and supply), particularly in the private equity universe,” according to a recent report from PwC. Blackstone recently gobbled up Seattle-based pet-sitting giant Rover in a $2.3 billion deal. Smartsheet revenue increased 17% to $276.4 million in its most recent quarter. The company’s operating loss was $8.5 million, vs. a loss of $36.1 million in the same period a year ago. Smartsheet’s revenue growth has slowed over the past four years, while its stock price has “gone nowhere for two years,” noted Martin Peers of The Information. “Smartsheet is a good example of the kind of software firm that’s most likely to sell — one that’s closely identified with a single product, whose growth is slowing, and that isn’t controlled by its founder,” Peers wrote. Smartsheet makes cloud-based enterprise work management technologies for managing and tracking projects, collaborating, storing data, and automating and assigning tasks, among other capabilities. It serves 85% of the Fortune 500 as customers. Its competitors include Airtable, Asana, Atlassian, ClickUp, Monday.com, Planview, and Wrike. Features of Google, Microsoft, and Adobe products also compete with Smartsheet’s capabilities. Smartsheet, which launched in 2005, has more than 3,300 employees. The company’s journey has not been entirely smooth sailing. Madrona managing director Matt McIlwain, whose firm was an early investor in Smartsheet, recalled how the company nearly ran out of cash in 2008 and didn’t hire a sales rep until 2011. “Early customers paid on average $500 per YEAR for a subscription and the company didn’t reach $10 million in revenue until 2012,” McIlwain, a board member at Smartsheet, wrote on LinkedIn. “Today the company is over $1 billion in revenue, generates substantial free cash flow and is the market leader in enterprise collaborative work management.”

Smartsheet verwacht weinig concurrentie voor overname van $8,4 miljard

Smartsheet heeft onlangs een overname van $8,4 miljard aangekondigd door Blackstone en Vista Equity Partners. Dit nieuws komt…

 Update, September 25, 11:15AM ET: It's Meta's big day! You can follow the event as it happens with commentary from Karissa Bell and Devindra Hardawar in our Meta Connect 2024 live updates story. The original article follows below. In the past, the biggest AR/VR event of the year has been known alternately as Oculus Connect and then Facebook Connect. But whatever the name, Meta’s fall event its primary showcase for the company’s latest and greatest achievements in the virtual reality and mixed reality space. Much like last year, we can likely predict the biggest news coming out of Meta Connect 2024 with just two acronyms: AI and AR.  Like every other big tech firm this year, Meta will be desperate to demonstrate how it plans to stay relevant in a future powered by AI. And now that we're seven months beyond the launch of Apple's Vision Pro, which arrived alongside a short-lived spike in interest in augmented reality (AR), Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg is likely eager to show off his own plans to make AR a reality. While Zuckerberg isn't as hot on the metaverse as he was when he renamed his company, the union of AI and AR is one way he can still make the dream of persistent virtual worlds come true. It might look less like Ready Player One, but if AR glasses actually take off, they could still let Meta control another piece of our digital world. And to help get them there, delivering an updated inexpensive VR headset couldn’t hurt. With all of that in mind, here are a few things we expect to see at Meta Connect 2024, which kicks off virtually tomorrow — September 25 — and runs for two days. The show starts with a 1PM ET livestream, which is expected to run about an hour. Orion AR glasses After reportedly killing a pricey next-generation mixed reality headset, which was meant to compete with the Apple Vision Pro, Meta is instead focusing on a pair of augmented reality glasses, codenamed Orion, as its next innovation. As seen in the background of one Mark Zuckerberg photo (above), and later somewhat confirmed by him, Orion resembles a pair of chunky hipster frames. Meta Unlike the Quest 3, which fully consumes your vision and uses cameras to show you a low-quality view of the world, Orion could let you see the real world like a normal pair of glasses. But, like Magic Leap and Microsoft's HoloLens before it, Meta’s glasses could layer holographic imagery on top of your reality. The key difference, of course, is that it appears to be far less cumbersome than those devices. “The glasses are, I think, going to be a big deal,” Zuckerberg said in an interview on the Blueprint Podcast (via RoadtoVR). “We’re almost ready to start showing the prototype version of the full holographic glasses. We’re not going to be selling it broadly; we’re focused on building the full consumer version rather than selling the prototype.” Back at Meta Connect 2022, Zuckerberg showed off how the company was thinking of AR glasses, together with an intriguing wrist-based controller: "It’s probably our most exciting prototype that we’ve had to date," Meta CTO Andrew Bosworth told The Verge last year. "I might get myself in trouble for saying this: I think it might be the most advanced piece of technology on the planet in its domain. In the domain of consumer electronics, it might be the most advanced thing that we’ve ever produced as a species." According to a leaked Meta roadmap, the company plans to release a new pair of Ray-Ban smart glasses next year which would add a small built-in screen alongside its existing camera, speaker and microphone. That would be followed by Meta’s first pair of consumer AR glasses in 2027. It makes sense that we'll see some sort of concept device this year. Much like Apple’s Vision Pro was effectively that company’s version of an AR/VR concept car to introduce developers to its notion of "spatial computing," Meta will need to give developers a way to use its platform so they can build their own AR experiences. Competitor Snap just debuted its fifth-generation AR Spectacles, and this version is oriented at developers (with a $99/month subscription fee).  A cheaper Quest 3 variant Instead of an upgraded headset, all signs point to Meta releasing a stripped-down version of the Quest 3 called the Quest 3S, reports Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman. Recent leaked images from Meta’s own Quest Link application has confirmed the headset’s existence. According to Gurman, the company is aiming to make it much cheaper than the current version, reportedly considering price points of $300 or $400, while still delivering an experience close to the Quest 3.  Meta via Gary_the_mememachine/Reddit The latest leak suggests it’ll start at just $299. A Reddit user shared a clip of an Amazon ad reportedly shown on Peacock that features the Quest 3S, complete with a price and storage (h/t UploadVR). Per the ad, the 128GB Quest 3S will cost $299, but there may be other storage options as well. It could potentially replace the Quest 2, which remains in the product line priced at $299 long after its 2020 release. So why would Meta do this? There’s a huge performance gap between the Quest 3 and Quest 2, which makes life difficult for developers. With a cheaper device that’s similar to the Quest 3, potentially using the same processor, it would be easier to build games that can scale across two price points. According to Bloomberg’s Gurman, Meta has also considered releasing some models of the new headset without any bundled controllers, which would push the price down even further. More AI, of course Expect Meta to show off even more ways it’s taking advantage of AI across its Quest headsets and the Ray-Ban smart glasses. The company rolled out multi-modal AI search capabilities on those glasses in January, which allowed you to ask the Meta AI about objects or landmarks you were looking at, or for a quick translation. Based on our testing, though, those features were surprisingly half-baked. Meta will likely discuss ways it’s improving those existing features by implementing its Llama 3.1 large language model (LLM), which it’s positioning as an open source competitor to Google and OpenAI’s LLMs. In particular, the company notes that Llama 3.1 offers dramatically improved translation, math and general knowledge capabilities. There’s certainly room for Meta to introduce new AI capabilities powered by Llama 3.1 in the Ray-Ban smart glasses, but given their limited processing power and battery life, we’ll probably have to wait for an updated model before we see anything truly groundbreaking. Karissa Bell contributed to this report. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ar-vr/meta-connect-2024-cheaper-quest-3s-ai-ar-and-everything-else-you-can-expect-at-the-metaverse-event-130011659.html?src=rss

Meta presenteert innovaties op Connect 2024

Meta Connect 2024 belooft een van de meest opwindende evenementen van het jaar te worden, met belangrijke aankondigingen…

 Update, September 25, 11:15AM ET: It's Meta's big day! You can follow the event as it happens with commentary from Karissa Bell and Devindra Hardawar in our Meta Connect 2024 live updates story. The original article follows below. In the past, the biggest AR/VR event of the year has been known alternately as Oculus Connect and then Facebook Connect. But whatever the name, Meta’s fall event its primary showcase for the company’s latest and greatest achievements in the virtual reality and mixed reality space. Much like last year, we can likely predict the biggest news coming out of Meta Connect 2024 with just two acronyms: AI and AR.  Like every other big tech firm this year, Meta will be desperate to demonstrate how it plans to stay relevant in a future powered by AI. And now that we're seven months beyond the launch of Apple's Vision Pro, which arrived alongside a short-lived spike in interest in augmented reality (AR), Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg is likely eager to show off his own plans to make AR a reality. While Zuckerberg isn't as hot on the metaverse as he was when he renamed his company, the union of AI and AR is one way he can still make the dream of persistent virtual worlds come true. It might look less like Ready Player One, but if AR glasses actually take off, they could still let Meta control another piece of our digital world. And to help get them there, delivering an updated inexpensive VR headset couldn’t hurt. With all of that in mind, here are a few things we expect to see at Meta Connect 2024, which kicks off virtually tomorrow — September 25 — and runs for two days. The show starts with a 1PM ET livestream, which is expected to run about an hour. Orion AR glasses After reportedly killing a pricey next-generation mixed reality headset, which was meant to compete with the Apple Vision Pro, Meta is instead focusing on a pair of augmented reality glasses, codenamed Orion, as its next innovation. As seen in the background of one Mark Zuckerberg photo (above), and later somewhat confirmed by him, Orion resembles a pair of chunky hipster frames. Meta Unlike the Quest 3, which fully consumes your vision and uses cameras to show you a low-quality view of the world, Orion could let you see the real world like a normal pair of glasses. But, like Magic Leap and Microsoft's HoloLens before it, Meta’s glasses could layer holographic imagery on top of your reality. The key difference, of course, is that it appears to be far less cumbersome than those devices. “The glasses are, I think, going to be a big deal,” Zuckerberg said in an interview on the Blueprint Podcast (via RoadtoVR). “We’re almost ready to start showing the prototype version of the full holographic glasses. We’re not going to be selling it broadly; we’re focused on building the full consumer version rather than selling the prototype.” Back at Meta Connect 2022, Zuckerberg showed off how the company was thinking of AR glasses, together with an intriguing wrist-based controller: "It’s probably our most exciting prototype that we’ve had to date," Meta CTO Andrew Bosworth told The Verge last year. "I might get myself in trouble for saying this: I think it might be the most advanced piece of technology on the planet in its domain. In the domain of consumer electronics, it might be the most advanced thing that we’ve ever produced as a species." According to a leaked Meta roadmap, the company plans to release a new pair of Ray-Ban smart glasses next year which would add a small built-in screen alongside its existing camera, speaker and microphone. That would be followed by Meta’s first pair of consumer AR glasses in 2027. It makes sense that we'll see some sort of concept device this year. Much like Apple’s Vision Pro was effectively that company’s version of an AR/VR concept car to introduce developers to its notion of "spatial computing," Meta will need to give developers a way to use its platform so they can build their own AR experiences. Competitor Snap just debuted its fifth-generation AR Spectacles, and this version is oriented at developers (with a $99/month subscription fee).  A cheaper Quest 3 variant Instead of an upgraded headset, all signs point to Meta releasing a stripped-down version of the Quest 3 called the Quest 3S, reports Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman. Recent leaked images from Meta’s own Quest Link application has confirmed the headset’s existence. According to Gurman, the company is aiming to make it much cheaper than the current version, reportedly considering price points of $300 or $400, while still delivering an experience close to the Quest 3.  Meta via Gary_the_mememachine/Reddit The latest leak suggests it’ll start at just $299. A Reddit user shared a clip of an Amazon ad reportedly shown on Peacock that features the Quest 3S, complete with a price and storage (h/t UploadVR). Per the ad, the 128GB Quest 3S will cost $299, but there may be other storage options as well. It could potentially replace the Quest 2, which remains in the product line priced at $299 long after its 2020 release. So why would Meta do this? There’s a huge performance gap between the Quest 3 and Quest 2, which makes life difficult for developers. With a cheaper device that’s similar to the Quest 3, potentially using the same processor, it would be easier to build games that can scale across two price points. According to Bloomberg’s Gurman, Meta has also considered releasing some models of the new headset without any bundled controllers, which would push the price down even further. More AI, of course Expect Meta to show off even more ways it’s taking advantage of AI across its Quest headsets and the Ray-Ban smart glasses. The company rolled out multi-modal AI search capabilities on those glasses in January, which allowed you to ask the Meta AI about objects or landmarks you were looking at, or for a quick translation. Based on our testing, though, those features were surprisingly half-baked. Meta will likely discuss ways it’s improving those existing features by implementing its Llama 3.1 large language model (LLM), which it’s positioning as an open source competitor to Google and OpenAI’s LLMs. In particular, the company notes that Llama 3.1 offers dramatically improved translation, math and general knowledge capabilities. There’s certainly room for Meta to introduce new AI capabilities powered by Llama 3.1 in the Ray-Ban smart glasses, but given their limited processing power and battery life, we’ll probably have to wait for an updated model before we see anything truly groundbreaking. Karissa Bell contributed to this report. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ar-vr/meta-connect-2024-cheaper-quest-3s-ai-ar-and-everything-else-you-can-expect-at-the-metaverse-event-130011659.html?src=rss

Meta presenteert updates tijdens Connect 2024 evenement

Meta Connect 2024 staat op het punt te beginnen, en het belooft een evenement vol baanbrekende innovaties te…

 Update, September 25, 11:15AM ET: It's Meta's big day! You can follow the event as it happens with commentary from Karissa Bell and Devindra Hardawar in our Meta Connect 2024 live updates story. The original article follows below. In the past, the biggest AR/VR event of the year has been known alternately as Oculus Connect and then Facebook Connect. But whatever the name, Meta’s fall event its primary showcase for the company’s latest and greatest achievements in the virtual reality and mixed reality space. Much like last year, we can likely predict the biggest news coming out of Meta Connect 2024 with just two acronyms: AI and AR.  Like every other big tech firm this year, Meta will be desperate to demonstrate how it plans to stay relevant in a future powered by AI. And now that we're seven months beyond the launch of Apple's Vision Pro, which arrived alongside a short-lived spike in interest in augmented reality (AR), Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg is likely eager to show off his own plans to make AR a reality. While Zuckerberg isn't as hot on the metaverse as he was when he renamed his company, the union of AI and AR is one way he can still make the dream of persistent virtual worlds come true. It might look less like Ready Player One, but if AR glasses actually take off, they could still let Meta control another piece of our digital world. And to help get them there, delivering an updated inexpensive VR headset couldn’t hurt. With all of that in mind, here are a few things we expect to see at Meta Connect 2024, which kicks off virtually tomorrow — September 25 — and runs for two days. The show starts with a 1PM ET livestream, which is expected to run about an hour. Orion AR glasses After reportedly killing a pricey next-generation mixed reality headset, which was meant to compete with the Apple Vision Pro, Meta is instead focusing on a pair of augmented reality glasses, codenamed Orion, as its next innovation. As seen in the background of one Mark Zuckerberg photo (above), and later somewhat confirmed by him, Orion resembles a pair of chunky hipster frames. Meta Unlike the Quest 3, which fully consumes your vision and uses cameras to show you a low-quality view of the world, Orion could let you see the real world like a normal pair of glasses. But, like Magic Leap and Microsoft's HoloLens before it, Meta’s glasses could layer holographic imagery on top of your reality. The key difference, of course, is that it appears to be far less cumbersome than those devices. “The glasses are, I think, going to be a big deal,” Zuckerberg said in an interview on the Blueprint Podcast (via RoadtoVR). “We’re almost ready to start showing the prototype version of the full holographic glasses. We’re not going to be selling it broadly; we’re focused on building the full consumer version rather than selling the prototype.” Back at Meta Connect 2022, Zuckerberg showed off how the company was thinking of AR glasses, together with an intriguing wrist-based controller: "It’s probably our most exciting prototype that we’ve had to date," Meta CTO Andrew Bosworth told The Verge last year. "I might get myself in trouble for saying this: I think it might be the most advanced piece of technology on the planet in its domain. In the domain of consumer electronics, it might be the most advanced thing that we’ve ever produced as a species." According to a leaked Meta roadmap, the company plans to release a new pair of Ray-Ban smart glasses next year which would add a small built-in screen alongside its existing camera, speaker and microphone. That would be followed by Meta’s first pair of consumer AR glasses in 2027. It makes sense that we'll see some sort of concept device this year. Much like Apple’s Vision Pro was effectively that company’s version of an AR/VR concept car to introduce developers to its notion of "spatial computing," Meta will need to give developers a way to use its platform so they can build their own AR experiences. Competitor Snap just debuted its fifth-generation AR Spectacles, and this version is oriented at developers (with a $99/month subscription fee).  A cheaper Quest 3 variant Instead of an upgraded headset, all signs point to Meta releasing a stripped-down version of the Quest 3 called the Quest 3S, reports Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman. Recent leaked images from Meta’s own Quest Link application has confirmed the headset’s existence. According to Gurman, the company is aiming to make it much cheaper than the current version, reportedly considering price points of $300 or $400, while still delivering an experience close to the Quest 3.  Meta via Gary_the_mememachine/Reddit The latest leak suggests it’ll start at just $299. A Reddit user shared a clip of an Amazon ad reportedly shown on Peacock that features the Quest 3S, complete with a price and storage (h/t UploadVR). Per the ad, the 128GB Quest 3S will cost $299, but there may be other storage options as well. It could potentially replace the Quest 2, which remains in the product line priced at $299 long after its 2020 release. So why would Meta do this? There’s a huge performance gap between the Quest 3 and Quest 2, which makes life difficult for developers. With a cheaper device that’s similar to the Quest 3, potentially using the same processor, it would be easier to build games that can scale across two price points. According to Bloomberg’s Gurman, Meta has also considered releasing some models of the new headset without any bundled controllers, which would push the price down even further. More AI, of course Expect Meta to show off even more ways it’s taking advantage of AI across its Quest headsets and the Ray-Ban smart glasses. The company rolled out multi-modal AI search capabilities on those glasses in January, which allowed you to ask the Meta AI about objects or landmarks you were looking at, or for a quick translation. Based on our testing, though, those features were surprisingly half-baked. Meta will likely discuss ways it’s improving those existing features by implementing its Llama 3.1 large language model (LLM), which it’s positioning as an open source competitor to Google and OpenAI’s LLMs. In particular, the company notes that Llama 3.1 offers dramatically improved translation, math and general knowledge capabilities. There’s certainly room for Meta to introduce new AI capabilities powered by Llama 3.1 in the Ray-Ban smart glasses, but given their limited processing power and battery life, we’ll probably have to wait for an updated model before we see anything truly groundbreaking. Karissa Bell contributed to this report. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ar-vr/meta-connect-2024-cheaper-quest-3s-ai-ar-and-everything-else-you-can-expect-at-the-metaverse-event-130011659.html?src=rss

Meta organiseert jaarlijkse Connect-conferentie

Hey iedereen! Meta Connect 2024 is bijna hier en het belooft spectaculair te worden! 🎉 We krijgen waarschijnlijk…

 Update, September 25, 11:15AM ET: It's Meta's big day! You can follow the event as it happens with commentary from Karissa Bell and Devindra Hardawar in our Meta Connect 2024 live updates story. The original article follows below. In the past, the biggest AR/VR event of the year has been known alternately as Oculus Connect and then Facebook Connect. But whatever the name, Meta’s fall event its primary showcase for the company’s latest and greatest achievements in the virtual reality and mixed reality space. Much like last year, we can likely predict the biggest news coming out of Meta Connect 2024 with just two acronyms: AI and AR.  Like every other big tech firm this year, Meta will be desperate to demonstrate how it plans to stay relevant in a future powered by AI. And now that we're seven months beyond the launch of Apple's Vision Pro, which arrived alongside a short-lived spike in interest in augmented reality (AR), Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg is likely eager to show off his own plans to make AR a reality. While Zuckerberg isn't as hot on the metaverse as he was when he renamed his company, the union of AI and AR is one way he can still make the dream of persistent virtual worlds come true. It might look less like Ready Player One, but if AR glasses actually take off, they could still let Meta control another piece of our digital world. And to help get them there, delivering an updated inexpensive VR headset couldn’t hurt. With all of that in mind, here are a few things we expect to see at Meta Connect 2024, which kicks off virtually tomorrow — September 25 — and runs for two days. The show starts with a 1PM ET livestream, which is expected to run about an hour. Orion AR glasses After reportedly killing a pricey next-generation mixed reality headset, which was meant to compete with the Apple Vision Pro, Meta is instead focusing on a pair of augmented reality glasses, codenamed Orion, as its next innovation. As seen in the background of one Mark Zuckerberg photo (above), and later somewhat confirmed by him, Orion resembles a pair of chunky hipster frames. Meta Unlike the Quest 3, which fully consumes your vision and uses cameras to show you a low-quality view of the world, Orion could let you see the real world like a normal pair of glasses. But, like Magic Leap and Microsoft's HoloLens before it, Meta’s glasses could layer holographic imagery on top of your reality. The key difference, of course, is that it appears to be far less cumbersome than those devices. “The glasses are, I think, going to be a big deal,” Zuckerberg said in an interview on the Blueprint Podcast (via RoadtoVR). “We’re almost ready to start showing the prototype version of the full holographic glasses. We’re not going to be selling it broadly; we’re focused on building the full consumer version rather than selling the prototype.” Back at Meta Connect 2022, Zuckerberg showed off how the company was thinking of AR glasses, together with an intriguing wrist-based controller: "It’s probably our most exciting prototype that we’ve had to date," Meta CTO Andrew Bosworth told The Verge last year. "I might get myself in trouble for saying this: I think it might be the most advanced piece of technology on the planet in its domain. In the domain of consumer electronics, it might be the most advanced thing that we’ve ever produced as a species." According to a leaked Meta roadmap, the company plans to release a new pair of Ray-Ban smart glasses next year which would add a small built-in screen alongside its existing camera, speaker and microphone. That would be followed by Meta’s first pair of consumer AR glasses in 2027. It makes sense that we'll see some sort of concept device this year. Much like Apple’s Vision Pro was effectively that company’s version of an AR/VR concept car to introduce developers to its notion of "spatial computing," Meta will need to give developers a way to use its platform so they can build their own AR experiences. Competitor Snap just debuted its fifth-generation AR Spectacles, and this version is oriented at developers (with a $99/month subscription fee).  A cheaper Quest 3 variant Instead of an upgraded headset, all signs point to Meta releasing a stripped-down version of the Quest 3 called the Quest 3S, reports Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman. Recent leaked images from Meta’s own Quest Link application has confirmed the headset’s existence. According to Gurman, the company is aiming to make it much cheaper than the current version, reportedly considering price points of $300 or $400, while still delivering an experience close to the Quest 3.  Meta via Gary_the_mememachine/Reddit The latest leak suggests it’ll start at just $299. A Reddit user shared a clip of an Amazon ad reportedly shown on Peacock that features the Quest 3S, complete with a price and storage (h/t UploadVR). Per the ad, the 128GB Quest 3S will cost $299, but there may be other storage options as well. It could potentially replace the Quest 2, which remains in the product line priced at $299 long after its 2020 release. So why would Meta do this? There’s a huge performance gap between the Quest 3 and Quest 2, which makes life difficult for developers. With a cheaper device that’s similar to the Quest 3, potentially using the same processor, it would be easier to build games that can scale across two price points. According to Bloomberg’s Gurman, Meta has also considered releasing some models of the new headset without any bundled controllers, which would push the price down even further. More AI, of course Expect Meta to show off even more ways it’s taking advantage of AI across its Quest headsets and the Ray-Ban smart glasses. The company rolled out multi-modal AI search capabilities on those glasses in January, which allowed you to ask the Meta AI about objects or landmarks you were looking at, or for a quick translation. Based on our testing, though, those features were surprisingly half-baked. Meta will likely discuss ways it’s improving those existing features by implementing its Llama 3.1 large language model (LLM), which it’s positioning as an open source competitor to Google and OpenAI’s LLMs. In particular, the company notes that Llama 3.1 offers dramatically improved translation, math and general knowledge capabilities. There’s certainly room for Meta to introduce new AI capabilities powered by Llama 3.1 in the Ray-Ban smart glasses, but given their limited processing power and battery life, we’ll probably have to wait for an updated model before we see anything truly groundbreaking. Karissa Bell contributed to this report. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ar-vr/meta-connect-2024-cheaper-quest-3s-ai-ar-and-everything-else-you-can-expect-at-the-metaverse-event-130011659.html?src=rss

Meta presenteert nieuwe Quest 3S, AI en AR-technologie tijdens Connect 2024

Meta Connect 2024 staat voor de deur! 🎉 Verwacht een goedkopere Quest 3S, baanbrekende AI en indrukwekkende AR-technologie.…

 Update, September 25, 11:15AM ET: It's Meta's big day! You can follow the event as it happens with commentary from Karissa Bell and Devindra Hardawar in our Meta Connect 2024 live updates story. The original article follows below. In the past, the biggest AR/VR event of the year has been known alternately as Oculus Connect and then Facebook Connect. But whatever the name, Meta’s fall event its primary showcase for the company’s latest and greatest achievements in the virtual reality and mixed reality space. Much like last year, we can likely predict the biggest news coming out of Meta Connect 2024 with just two acronyms: AI and AR.  Like every other big tech firm this year, Meta will be desperate to demonstrate how it plans to stay relevant in a future powered by AI. And now that we're seven months beyond the launch of Apple's Vision Pro, which arrived alongside a short-lived spike in interest in augmented reality (AR), Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg is likely eager to show off his own plans to make AR a reality. While Zuckerberg isn't as hot on the metaverse as he was when he renamed his company, the union of AI and AR is one way he can still make the dream of persistent virtual worlds come true. It might look less like Ready Player One, but if AR glasses actually take off, they could still let Meta control another piece of our digital world. And to help get them there, delivering an updated inexpensive VR headset couldn’t hurt. With all of that in mind, here are a few things we expect to see at Meta Connect 2024, which kicks off virtually tomorrow — September 25 — and runs for two days. The show starts with a 1PM ET livestream, which is expected to run about an hour. Orion AR glasses After reportedly killing a pricey next-generation mixed reality headset, which was meant to compete with the Apple Vision Pro, Meta is instead focusing on a pair of augmented reality glasses, codenamed Orion, as its next innovation. As seen in the background of one Mark Zuckerberg photo (above), and later somewhat confirmed by him, Orion resembles a pair of chunky hipster frames. Meta Unlike the Quest 3, which fully consumes your vision and uses cameras to show you a low-quality view of the world, Orion could let you see the real world like a normal pair of glasses. But, like Magic Leap and Microsoft's HoloLens before it, Meta’s glasses could layer holographic imagery on top of your reality. The key difference, of course, is that it appears to be far less cumbersome than those devices. “The glasses are, I think, going to be a big deal,” Zuckerberg said in an interview on the Blueprint Podcast (via RoadtoVR). “We’re almost ready to start showing the prototype version of the full holographic glasses. We’re not going to be selling it broadly; we’re focused on building the full consumer version rather than selling the prototype.” Back at Meta Connect 2022, Zuckerberg showed off how the company was thinking of AR glasses, together with an intriguing wrist-based controller: "It’s probably our most exciting prototype that we’ve had to date," Meta CTO Andrew Bosworth told The Verge last year. "I might get myself in trouble for saying this: I think it might be the most advanced piece of technology on the planet in its domain. In the domain of consumer electronics, it might be the most advanced thing that we’ve ever produced as a species." According to a leaked Meta roadmap, the company plans to release a new pair of Ray-Ban smart glasses next year which would add a small built-in screen alongside its existing camera, speaker and microphone. That would be followed by Meta’s first pair of consumer AR glasses in 2027. It makes sense that we'll see some sort of concept device this year. Much like Apple’s Vision Pro was effectively that company’s version of an AR/VR concept car to introduce developers to its notion of "spatial computing," Meta will need to give developers a way to use its platform so they can build their own AR experiences. Competitor Snap just debuted its fifth-generation AR Spectacles, and this version is oriented at developers (with a $99/month subscription fee).  A cheaper Quest 3 variant Instead of an upgraded headset, all signs point to Meta releasing a stripped-down version of the Quest 3 called the Quest 3S, reports Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman. Recent leaked images from Meta’s own Quest Link application has confirmed the headset’s existence. According to Gurman, the company is aiming to make it much cheaper than the current version, reportedly considering price points of $300 or $400, while still delivering an experience close to the Quest 3.  Meta via Gary_the_mememachine/Reddit The latest leak suggests it’ll start at just $299. A Reddit user shared a clip of an Amazon ad reportedly shown on Peacock that features the Quest 3S, complete with a price and storage (h/t UploadVR). Per the ad, the 128GB Quest 3S will cost $299, but there may be other storage options as well. It could potentially replace the Quest 2, which remains in the product line priced at $299 long after its 2020 release. So why would Meta do this? There’s a huge performance gap between the Quest 3 and Quest 2, which makes life difficult for developers. With a cheaper device that’s similar to the Quest 3, potentially using the same processor, it would be easier to build games that can scale across two price points. According to Bloomberg’s Gurman, Meta has also considered releasing some models of the new headset without any bundled controllers, which would push the price down even further. More AI, of course Expect Meta to show off even more ways it’s taking advantage of AI across its Quest headsets and the Ray-Ban smart glasses. The company rolled out multi-modal AI search capabilities on those glasses in January, which allowed you to ask the Meta AI about objects or landmarks you were looking at, or for a quick translation. Based on our testing, though, those features were surprisingly half-baked. Meta will likely discuss ways it’s improving those existing features by implementing its Llama 3.1 large language model (LLM), which it’s positioning as an open source competitor to Google and OpenAI’s LLMs. In particular, the company notes that Llama 3.1 offers dramatically improved translation, math and general knowledge capabilities. There’s certainly room for Meta to introduce new AI capabilities powered by Llama 3.1 in the Ray-Ban smart glasses, but given their limited processing power and battery life, we’ll probably have to wait for an updated model before we see anything truly groundbreaking. Karissa Bell contributed to this report. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ar-vr/meta-connect-2024-cheaper-quest-3s-ai-ar-and-everything-else-you-can-expect-at-the-metaverse-event-130011659.html?src=rss

Meta presenteert Quest 3S en updates voor AI en AR tijdens Connect 2024

Meta Connect 2024 is hier! Goedkopere Quest 3S, AI, AR en meer. Volg de livestream vanaf 25 september…
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