How far have we come from the moment when the IoT term was coined in 1999, by Kevin Ashton? Well, the usage has certainly improved by leaps and bounds from the toaster, the very first IoT device. The Internet of Things definitely took off in 2014 and it is still surprising us daily. Its advantages are incredible, but they do come at a price.

Benefits of IoT

Easy Access

Right now, you can easily access the necessary information in real-time, from (almost) whichever location you are at. All it takes is a smart device and internet connection.

We use Google Maps to see where we are, instead of asking a person in the street. Booking is simpler than ever. Factual information is easily accessible, even from the latest scientific research, or business analysis. It is only a click away.

Speed

All this data pouring in enables us to complete numerous tasks with envying speed. For example, IoT makes automation easy. Smart offices automate repetitive tasks, thus allowing employees to invest their time and effort into something more challenging.

Adapting to New Standards

Though IoT is ever-changing, its alterations are minimal compared to the rest of the high tech world. Without IoT, it would be hard for us to keep track of all the latest updates.

Better Time Management

Overall, the IoT is an incredible time-saving tool. We can search for the latest news on our phones during our daily commute, or visit a blog about our favorite pastime, purchase an item in an online shop, you name it.
Eventually, we end up with much more time on our hands.

However, nothing is perfect.

Disadvantages of IoT

Data Breach

Having easy access to data is wonderful. Unfortunately, our own private data is more exposed than ever too. Statistics (from a website: idstrong dot com) show some worrying figures. 12.7 million Americans were victims of identity theft. A credit card number is the type of information that was most compromised, followed by a debit card number.
Data breaches are extremely stressful. Companies also fear them and can lose the trust of their clients for good if the cyber attack came via their website pages.
The riskiest devices are said to be: smart toys for kids, off-brand IoT gadgets, second-hand smart devices, and the latest, suspicious apps (about the newest unusual devices).

Dependence

The IoT, obviously, is dependent on the internet connection. When there is none, it can’t be used.
On the other hand, we have become increasingly dependent on the IoT’s everyday usage. Not only in business, but in our private lives. If we don’t download the desired information quickly, we are prone to becoming agitated and upset, even about the most trivial content.
To this end, the IoT does not always bring out the best in us and it has contributed to the great decrease in our attention spans.

Complexity

Though IoT seems to be completing tasks with ease, a lot of complex operations are behind it. Consequently, if the software makes a wrong calculation, this will affect the rest of the process. The above-mentioned over-reliance can be very dangerous sometimes. At best, we won’t know how to deal with the wrong temperature in our green home. At worst, a glitch in water dam software could cause a disastrous flood.
Therefore, oftentimes a mistake in IoT is not always easy to fix.

To Sum Up

The IoT has brought us many amazing things and it continues to surprise us in lots of sectors: business, healthcare, our private lives. As for the downsides, now that you are more aware of them, try to keep those under control. Protect your data and be aware of how automation and easy access can affect you or your business.

The post The Biggest Advantages and Disadvantages of IoT appeared first on ReadWrite.

Not so long ago, you thought that if you could tell your house to play you a song or your fridge to check up on the groceries and make you a list — you must be a Jetson — or some other science fiction person. To those of us who still remember the invention of the mobile phone — we can quite clearly see how  The Internet of Things (IoT) has permeated almost every core of our society.

A Brief List of Reasons Why IoT can Rule Many Non-Device Industries

It no longer takes a giant imagination to see how many non-device industries are going to be ruled by IoT — and maybe IoT can completely take it over.

Real Estate Is Getting Smarter

Millennials have just started home hunting, and judging by the fact that they’re willing to pay five percent above the average price so they could have a smart home, this certainly sparks interest.

When you think about it, it’s quite expected. Smart home features go beyond thermostat. There are smart lights, smart security cameras, automatic garage openers, motion alarm detectors, and plenty of other gadgets and systems that make our lives easier.

Essentially, real estate is about “location, location, location,” bathrooms, kitchens, and good insulation. Nevertheless, the IoT is changing the real estate market. When high-tech Generation Z is old enough to look for homes, we’ll probably witness an even greater change.

Personal Assistants Lose Value

The personal assistants will always exist, no doubt about it, but the number of people needed to keep track of events and meetings has definitely diminished.

Unfortunately, a worker with superb organizational skills that were once considered an invaluable asset is pretty much replaceable nowadays. For instance, for a private dentistry office to work, one has to keep track of all the available doctors, and quickly find the best time for the client. The front office deals with the cancellations and notifies the doctor so they can be on time. All patients can be kept track of — like patients records and insurance — whose canceled a couple of times in a row — tired yet?

Well, now all of that hard work is done by software, or an application, or some other automated system. Naturally, there is a person still there, but you needn’t pay them a fortune as they don’t possess specialized skills. No longer does your professional success rely heavily on an individual — now success is on the best software, bot, and personal assistant.

Publishing Prospects

Publishing prospects are not just e-books, online self-publishing, though it is very much connected to them. What the internet of things has brought us above all is incredible access to information and impatience. With wireless, you can do research on almost everything.

In former days you had to read through a whole article in order to answer one single question, such as “What is the percentage of freelancers in the US.” Today you just type a question (or the phrase) in your browser — and wha-la — you’ll get a direct answer. Often you don’t even have to bother clicking on the article.

Consequently, reading material is becoming shorter and shorter. Books made of paper still haven’t met their demise, but newspapers are seriously shaken by IoT. At the same time, devices will start searching for online information as well.

Changes in Hospitality

Thanks to websites such as Airbnb and Booking.com, hotels and similar facilities have suffered a huge blow. Today, you don’t even have to meet the host in person to get the keys. Everything can be done with smart locks and the help of your mobile phone. Smart home amenities are especially appealing to some, similarly to the real estate situation above.

Services and Monitoring

Yes, we’re all aware mobile apps have replaced millions of workers answering the phone, especially when it comes to taxi operators, for example. We can order our food via an app, and we can do it in a matter of minutes instead of waiting for someone to answer the call, wait for them to jot down the order, etc.

However, let’s talk about drones for a moment.

Today there is absolutely no need to send a cameraman into the air with a helicopter. Apart from filming sites from above for specific purposes (traffic monitoring, law enforcement), or dusting crops, drones can have an even more serious task. Fighter pilots are more than happy to be replaced by drones in some military missions as this can literally save their lives.

Conclusion

As you can see, the IoT extends its reach constantly. Would you say your life has changed for the better? In what ways? Hopefully, the IoT has provided you with new opportunities rather than challenges.

The post Non-Device Industries that are Going to be Ruled by IoT appeared first on ReadWrite.

You’ve got a great idea, and you’re hoping to get the most money out of it. However, even with the best software package in the world, you won’t be earning much if you don’t follow a few basic pre-launch steps. Here is a software pre-launch checklist — six things you have to do.

In today’s world, being well-prepared is everything.

Here is what you need to take care of in order to get the big bucks.

Who’s Who

There are three factors you have to define:

• Your target audience — who is the product for? How old are they? What do they do? Why do they want it? How is it going to satisfy their biggest need?
• Your competition — can you learn something from them? What do you have that they don’t?
• Yourself — define your image and your brand. Today, a well-defined brand makes or breaks a business. Millennials are the most brand-loyal generation we’ve seen so far. Sure, the quality of the product is what makes the customers stay, but you have to attract them first.

Early Domain Bird

Think about the ideal name for your software and reduce the options to a couple. Conduct some market research to find out which name resonates best with your audience. Once that is done, hurry up and get your domain and site ready and working online.

You should have your domain secured and be checking it off the list — even if the official launching day is still far away.

Testing, Testing

Quality assessment can be done in several ways. For example, you can outsource to a software testing company to conduct manual testing of your product. You might discover that you’ve overlooked some details — or your targets may praise some qualities you didn’t think of promoting in your marketing campaigns. After testing, you’ll know the right things to put in your software.

Testing is just one of many QA strategies that you could employ, and it’s not all about the customers or parts of your software. You should establish a quality culture among your workers as well. Find ways how to motivate the employees to dedicate to delivering the highest quality.

Train the Team

Depending on the software you’re creating, informative client support can represent the turning point. Some software options are taken for granted and customers mainly decide on the price and a couple of features offered.

The big players, however, wish to know much, much more. Educate your team to be able to answer all the impossible questions. Your team deserves to know all the details, advantages, and downsides, in order to be able to provide the best arguments.

Marketing Matters

How can you attract new clients?

Think special offers and free trials to get the word out. But first, your software package must seem appealing. Work on your logo and employ the best designers. As we have said before, branding is extremely important. Apple’s logo is not just a lucky coincidence.

Font psychology is nothing to be sneezed at. The shapes and colors send irrevocable messages.

Strategic Plan

Don’t wait to see how things turn out for you. Just like planning the launch, you should also have a plan ready for everything that follows. Whether the sales go up or down, you should know how to react.

For instance, if the sales are doing extremely well, how are you going to invest the money? Conversely, if the sales are down, you must have new sale techniques ready in advance, or perhaps calculate the time needed to make alterations to the software package.

Final Words

As you can see, there’s a lot of work ahead of you. Get down to it, and start checking things off our list as soon as possible. Make sure you check all of the items on your list. Ask other people’s opinions and consider them.

Have a solid business plan and follow it. Skipping a step can only backfire. Don’t lose the game of your software in the pre-launch — even before you started playing.

The post Software Pre-Launch Checklist: 6 Things You Have to Do appeared first on ReadWrite.

Imagine you go to a bookstore, and you notice and exciting cover. You pick the book, read the summary at the back, and the rave reviews. The plot seems intriguing enough, but when you check for the writer, it says “ by AI-something.” Would you buy the book, or would you think that was a waste of money? We will have those decisions moving into the future, and who will be responsible for such writings? But, that shows how AI is learning to play with words.

You may as well decide now if you will purchase content written by AI. That’s what the future will bring — AI is learning to play with words.

All of us have gotten used to chatbots and their limited capacity, but it appears their boundaries will be surpassed. Dario Amodei, OpenAI’s research director, informs us they have created a language modeling program which is very imaginative, to say the least. Its latest achievement was creating counterarguments and discussions with the researchers.

The program was fed a variety of articles, blogs, websites, and other content from the internet. Surprisingly, it managed to produce an essay worthy of any reputable writing service, and on a particularly challenging topic, by the way (Why Recycling Is Bad for the World).

Did the researchers do anything to help the program by providing specific, additional input? Certainly not. GPT-2, OpenAI’s new algorithm, did everything on its own. It excelled in different tests, such as storytelling, and predicting the next line in a sentence. Admittedly, it’s still far from inventing an utterly gripping story from beginning to the end as it tends to stray off topic — but it has great potential.

What sets GPT-2 apart from other similar AI programs is its versatility. Typically, such programs are skilled only for certain areas and can complete only specific tasks. However, this AI language model uses its input and successfully deals with a variety of topics.

What exactly can this AI program do?

For starters, the program could be used for summarizing articles or translating. Chatbots would be more informative and flexible. Ultimately, the program could turn into an excellent personal assistant, summarizing the reports for you, and sending out a proper company or business information. These types of programs would more or less be doing what a human PA already does.

There are several very negative possibilities.

At present, this type of AI program pretty much comes down to work best depending on what kind of material it is being fed with. For instance, if this AI program is given offensive, violent content. If the AI is given specific articles degrading individual nations or races (take some Hitler’s propaganda, for example), GPT-2 would respond similarly and produce vile and offensive content.

The system could be abused for automated and refined trolling.

People would be convinced they are receiving someone’s real opinions, instead of an automated response by a machine. Also, phishing schemes would become much easier to pull off. Certainly, the cyber hacks will be all over this AI code and work. The internet could be overfilled with artificial content. Do we want this as our only future? Let’s remember the example of pornographic deepfakes — a classic example of how top technology was abused when released into the public.

What is to come out of all the new AI code?

As the proponents of AI and AI code freely themselves admit — only the future will show what is really in the works at present. In the meantime, OpenAI will continue to invest resources in their innovative language model and feed it with more and more data, hoping for the best. Will we be on the receiving end of “the best?” The answer to that question will remain to be seen.

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Fintech has proven invaluable in the startup world. When you’re starting from scratch, you need all the help you can get, and fintech solutions quickly come to the rescue. Thanks to these financial services, many a small business has begun to thrive. Let’s take a closer look at how technology has simplified the financial matters for initially small ventures.

Loans and lenders

Hardly any startup is completely satisfied with its finances the moment it begins to operate. There are plenty of challenges ahead which could easily be solved by a quick bank loan. While in the old days even qualifying for the loan meant walking from one bank to the other with tons of paperwork, nowadays the whole process is much simpler.

You can be only a few clicks away from having your credit score estimated, or your loan pre-approved. For starters, just find an online loan calculator. Time is money, and this is extremely time-saving. Also, it is much easier to gain a better knowledge of the different offers and compare them before taking the plunge.

Overseas fees

All entrepreneurs shiver at the very thought how much they had to pay to credit companies when they were doing business with overseas clients. Let’s admit it, no one likes wasting money on high transaction fees, and that had to come to an end. With services such as PayPal, more money can be spent on “what matters,” and that is investment growth.

Instant invoicing

The most dreadful situation for every startup is the period when you are entitled to the money for your services and products (as they have already been delivered), but you are still waiting for the clients to pay the invoice they have received.

Today, however, a startup can choose to finance the receivables instantly. Professional investors can be invited to finance the invoices for a negligible fee, while the startup decides which invoices it wants to see financed, i.e., how much money it wishes to collect.

Satisfied customers

Automated billing processes will increase efficiency and accuracy. It can also improve customer experience to reduce churn. For instance, automated emails on a comprehensive billing platform can handle payment reminders, declined card notifications, renewal notices, etc.

Good subscription management software will contribute to your bottom line by reducing revenue leakage and handling complex compliance issues like revenue recognition. In short, a robust fintech billing solution ensures seamless cash flow, scalability, revenue growth, and improves customer satisfaction.

Cybersafety

Another advantage of fintech is the fact that it has also raised the bar when it comes to cybersecurity. Since fintech has made all the payment processes much simpler and faster, it is only too luring an opportunity for hackers. That’s why cybersecurity has been strengthened, and methods such as fingerprint and voice recognition are no longer reserved for spy movies.

Financial overview

One of the biggest advantages of fintech is the fact it gives the owner an opportunity to be fully aware of how the company financially stands at the moment, instead of waiting for the monthly reports. As well as that, fintech services make it possible not to oversee the bills which are due.

Admittedly, every small startup struggles at the beginning with paying regular bills and tends to delay the inevitable long enough to get hold of the expected revenue. Unfortunately, it so happens that the deadline is passed, which calls for some extra fees. Nevertheless, fintech gives out timely warnings.

To summarize, fintech has greatly influenced the lives of both business owners and their customers, but in a great way. It makes the business run smooth, enabling the startup to tackle the challenges successfully and evolve into a bigger company.

As for the downsides, perhaps the only one would be that it may become hard to keep track of the latest fintech solutions, which are constantly appearing, and differentiate among the best.

The post How Fintech Can Help Startups Grow Faster appeared first on ReadWrite.

When working on software development, no matter the team you are on, it is crucial that all people involved share a common belief. That belief is that testing is extremely important and should be executed in the most accurate manner possible. The actual testing means in order for your software to be reliable and error-proof — the quality assurance (QA) must be proven. This proof helps you and your team build a sustainable brand.

The common problem testing teams face in choosing the type of Quality Assurance Test (QA) they should apply.

There are three types of QA testing, each of them being used in today’s industry and each of them working effectively depending on a number of different key factors.

Listed here are the pros and cons of each type of QA testing, trying to give you a comprehensive overview of the entire concept:

Manual Testing

First and foremost, we have to go all the way back to the beginning, more exactly, to manual testing.

When it comes to manual testing, there is an actual person, named a QA Analyst, who is designated to discover bugs in software that is under development. This person has to check all the essential features of an application, without using any automation software testing tools.

Now let’s list some pros and cons of manual testing:

PROS:

• • The visual feedback is fast and accurate.
  • Least expensive.
  • The benefit of human judgment and intuition.
  • No need for code.

CONS:

• The least reliable method. It’s prone to human mistakes.
• The process can’t be recorded accurately as each human picks their own method to record. There has not been a standard written for recording this method.
  
• Sometimes, some tasks are more difficult to perform manually, which could be time-consuming.

Automated Testing

Things with automated testing are pretty straight forward: some people write code/scripts, meant to automate the test execution. This type of testing relies entirely on a pre-scripted test, which runs automatically and it is intended to compare the actual results with the expected results.

Pros and cons of automated testing:

PROS:

• • Finds more bugs than human testing.
  • Speedy and efficient process.
  • It can be recorded and the scripts can be reused.
  • It works continuously, without the human need of resting and taking breaks.
  • It increases productivity because of the speedy process.

CONS:

• Given the fact that there are no humans, it is harder to get insights into the visual aspects of your UI.
• Sometimes, the tools needed for automated testing can increase the total cost of the project.
• It is still a limited concept.
• Debugging is a huge problem, and very time consuming one.

Crowdsourced Testing

Crowdsourced testing is the latest addition to the testing industry. Crowdsourced testing implies delegating testing tasks to a group of experts that will make sure that a piece of software has the right quality. Even though it’s still not the most popular solution — it’s emerging quickly and shows good results, especially when it comes to crowdsourced mobile app testing.

Pros and cons of crowdsourced testing:

PROS:

• It can be extremely fast, with accurate results returned in less than 24 hours.
• It can actually end up being pretty cheap.
• It is especially great for small teams, who don’t have enough time or enough team members to do everything. Employing a crowdsourced approach is the best option for people with little to no resources.
  

CONS:

• Bugs are caught later in the development process.
• Not every test is suitable for crowdsourced testing. If a certain test is has a length of more than 10 steps, there’s a possibility of tester error.
• Testers often have problems when it comes to communicating with each other and exchanging information, especially if they are located in different time zones.

At the end of the day, no matter which type of QA testing your team goes for, you have to remember one thing: testing is a crucial part of any software development process.

When it comes to choosing one of the three types of QA testing, it often depends on many aspects. These aspects can be issues including project budget, number of people in a team and the period of time a team has to complete a project. On one side, there is a strong reason why manual testing is still efficient and still chosen by a good number of developing teams out there.

On the other side, automated testing has its benefits, and its power is more than obvious. But then again, only certain teams can afford this type or testing. The question may come done to — do they actually need this type of test? Also, crowdsourced testing should not be avoided, as it opens up a new door for the future of QA testing.

The post QA Testing – Manual, Automated, or Crowdsourced appeared first on ReadWrite.

The IoT technology is not only taking over the industry, but it’s taking over our households, too. The number of IoT devices is rapidly increasing everyday — all with the intent for us be able to control everything at the touch of a button.

No problems this far in the IoT home device plan. Everything sounds amazing, right?

Well, things aren’t always as simple as they seem. There’s definitely a downside when it comes to digitalizing our entire existence.

This is where we start talking about security — one of the most imperative modern world problems. The thing is that if we really want to take full advantage of the amazing opportunities that IoT is able to bring us, we must learn how to secure our devices. This will be especially essential — if your device is connected to our homes.

Hence in this article, we will go over some of the consequences of not securing your IoT devices from hackers and we’ll discuss some of the ways to avoid this from happening.

The Consequences

First and foremost, before discussing how to avoid hackers from getting into your IoT devices, we should go over some of the consequences of not securing them.

Since 2015, when the IoT devices started to become more and more popular, the technology has been a controversial subject. Recently, the FBI released a statement through which they warned people in the entire world that these devices can be as dangerous as they are useful. Of course, we had the CIA warning about the devices and connectivity — and now they are leading the charge to have all of us connect to each other — and to them. Hence, the “Zuckerberg trials,” last April. 

When you think about these dangers, the first thing that comes to mind, is cybercrime.

Cybercriminals are more than able to place malware on your devices, which can lead to stealing your personal information and and a lot worse than that. Some other consequences — the more serious ones — might include physical safety threats or even home break-ins. All of the home invasion incidences can occur because people have not secured their IoT devices.

Below, we discussed some of the best practices when it comes to securing your high-tech IoT devices.

The Security Measures to avoid a breach

From the most basic, obvious to the more techy ones — here are some of the most important security measures you should take for your Internet of Things devices:

• Passwords. You might think that it’s not worthy to mention this, but I really can’t stress enough how important this step is, given the fact that people have the tendency to forget about it. Don’t leave any default passwords around, no matter if we talk about your device or the router. The key when it comes to this step, is to set some passwords that are definitely not easy to guess. You could try using a phrase as your password, or even better, you can use a password manager. The best passwords are the one that contains uppercase letters, lowercase letters, numbers and special characters. The longer it is, the better .
• Secured connections. One thing is for sure: if you want to get the most out of your IoT devices, you will need to connect them to the Internet. But the trick is not to connect the entire Internet to them, and that’s why you’ll want to use a virtual private network (VPN). This isn’t enough, however.  For more safety, you’ll need a VPN suitable for your particular device — for instance, if you’re accessing the internet with a MacBook, you’ll need to search for the Best VPN for Mac. This is one of the most effective way to securely connect your device to the Internet.
• Updates. No manufacturer ever will assure you that the device that they’re selling is one hundred percent secure. That’s why they always work on improving their products and regularly release updates. And it’s your job to make sure that you install those updates as soon as you can.
• Access. In this area, it’s up to you to make a decision. Ask yourself the following question: Do I need to be connected to the Internet in order to use my device or not? In case the answer is ‘no’, you definitely want to simply limit access to your own home network.
• UPnP. The UPnP (Universal Plug and Play) can make some devices, like your printers, cameras or routers, very vulnerable to attack from cybercriminals. It does help in setting up your devices, but from the security perspective, it would be best for you to turn off the UPnP.
• Cloud services. A good part of IoT devices rely on cloud services and that is not so great, given the fact that you have to be connected to the Internet at all times in order to access the cloud. And that brings us to the problem mentioned above, about the secured connections and limiting access.

The Security Measures after a breach

While experiencing or after experiencing a breach in security, however, below are few steps that can be taken to cushion the attack and prevent a future breach.

• Guard the critical data. In every system, some data are bound to be more critical than others. Some of such data may include a business’ financial records, consumers’ passwords, credit card details and so on. It’s important to reach for such data first, before trying to regain control of the whole system.
• Retain the attack. If a particular section gets breached within a system, it’s advisable to separate that section from the rest. This can be done by changing the password of the secure sections and activating two-factor authentication as well.
• Notify everyone affected. In a case where others were also affected by a security breach, it’s important to notify the parties involved as soon as possible so they can take security measures on their part. A good example is the LinkedIn security breach, where all users were advised to change their password on LinkedIn, and everywhere else where they used the same password.
• Learn from the breach. From every breach, review the attack and learn what sectors of your security system is vulnerable, and what your security team is doing wrong. Then work to fix it.

If you are dealing with sensitive data, and even if you are not and you’re just using IoT devices, you must be aware of what can happen if you don’t secure these devices.

After you understand the importance of this required action, follow the simple steps that lead you to taking the right security measures and make the world a better place by blocking cybercriminals.

The post How To Secure Your IoT Devices And Why Should You Do It appeared first on ReadWrite.

We are living in the digital era, where everything changes at a rapid pace, with each new technology that’s coming our way. One of these world changing technologies is IoT. What are the reasons behind slow adoption of IoT?

How is everything going to change when IoT will completely take over our lives? Every device, machine, animal or even human will somehow be directly connected to the Internet.

One very large problem world-wide is that business owners – even government entities – have not realized that IoT is not simply IT. This puts all of us at risks with cybersecurity.

The best thing about it is that all these interconnected devices and beings are going to be able to communicate with one another. But when is this going to happen? Of course, some changes are already obvious and people are currently working in order to develop more of the IoT technology, but everything happens at a much slower pace than it was expected. What are the reasons behind the slow adoption of IoT?

It Takes Time and Money

When a new technology comes out in the world, large companies are the first ones to take over and try to develop those technologies and implement them in order to better run their business. That’s great, but for a complete takeover and success, small companies also have to be able to develop a technology like IoT.

First things first, reality is that the Internet of Things is not cheap.

The majority of companies are not ready when it comes to financially investing in such projects. Even if somehow your company gets all the necessary financial resources in order to kick off an IoT project, there comes a other issues.

A big issue is time.

It takes a lot of time for people in a company to learn how to develop IoT, because it is not an easy technology to handle. If there’s something that companies don’t have – especially small companies – it’s definitely enough time.

It’s Hard To See the Benefits

Let’s imagine for a minute that there is no problem when it comes to investing time and money. And truth to be told, sometimes there is not.

One thing that every business does, is studying their competitors. Actually, in order to run a successful business, you definitely have to do that.

When it comes to the Internet of Things, there is a lack of small business case studies, which are the key aspect that would influence other businesses to move towards a more digitalized world. Given the fact that people don’t have enough stories to tell about great IoT project, and there’s a lack of proof that a particular IoT solution is actually very beneficial, they find it hard to invest in it.

IoT Lacks Standardization

The thing is that there are no standards whatsoever when it comes to an IoT project. If a company decides to use IoT in order to create a product, they would do whatever they find comfortable, given the fact that nothing is established in this domain. But why do we need standardization with the Internet of Things?

Well, remember earlier when we mentioned that all the IoT devices are going to be interconnected? It is obviously way harder to connect these devices with one another, if they work on different standards. That’s why it is important to establish once and for all some standards for development of IoT devices, this being the perfect way to create an innovative and faster ecosystem for our future.

IoT Still Lacks Specialists

Take the Internet as you know it. There are literally millions of web developers and web designers out there, making it  very affordable to create a simple web page for almost anything.

But when it comes to the Internet of Things, given the fact that this technology is fairly new, the number of IoT specialists is very low. This area is a much harder to grasp. Few people out there are adventurous enough to try to develop IoT projects.

With such a small number of IoT specialists, it’s pretty obvious that the number of IoT projects is just as small. This is also one of the main reasons why it is so expensive to build an IoT solution.

The number of people that can actually perform correct I0T procedure is very limited.

It’s definitely a challenge. The technology itself is hard to handle, and there are still no standards for implementations and developing whatsoever.

There are just a few people out there who are able to do IoT with correct and be able to stay and on top of it — making it is quite expensive. At the end of the day, it is more than worth it. The adoption of the Internet of Things at a global level is slow for sure, but it is happening, and it’s definitely not stopping anytime soon.

The post 4 Reasons Behind Slow Adoption of IoT appeared first on ReadWrite.

What was the promise of reduced admissions and improved health outcomes in patients? This goal has not been achieved and is not happening how we thought it would. Usage of mobile devices in healthcare is basically what mHealth is.

App development for healthcare.

Using the continuous mHealth-powered, patient-provider connection — is what drives the mobile healthcare market. However, the increasing wave of attracted app development and investments is expected to boost the market up to $102.35B by 2023.

The app forecasts.

Forecasts alone cannot keep the interest in healthcare app development in the long run. Clinical stakeholders, payers, and consumers altogether need tangible results from mHealth to prove its efficiency and highlight priority areas to focus on. Here’s where it gets complicated.

Scarce evidence for mobile app (mHealth).

A recent overviews comes from the scientists from the Centre for Research in Evidence-Based Practice. Located at Bond University in Queensland, Australia. The scientists concluded that there is not enough evidence to decide whether providers should recommend the currently available mHealth apps to their patients.

Data gathered from 4 databases since 2008.

The team inspected four databases from 2008 onwards and the Journal of Medical Internet Research.  This collection identified only six systematic reviews with 23 randomized controlled trials (RCTs).

Evaluations.

Evaluating 22 standalone healthcare apps was the goal. These apps are mostly targeting obesity, mental health, and diabetes. Meanwhile, the mHealth Economics 2017 study states that major app stores feature around 325,000 unique health apps.

So, in ten years, only 22 were apps evaluated.

According to the researchers, “most trials were pilots with small sample sizes and of short duration. Risk of bias of the included reviews and trials was high.”

Quality of evidence.

The overview also states that “the overall low quality of the evidence of effectiveness greatly limits the prescribe-ability of health apps. mHealth apps need to be evaluated by more robust randomized controlled trial’s (RCTs) that report between-group differences before becoming prescribe-able.”

The possible harm of under-researched healthcare apps.

This lack of proven credibility lowers the chances of healthcare apps to become full-fledged care delivery tools used in clinical settings and in patients’ homes. Instead, apps that are healthcare apps will be either perceived as a huge market of novelty toys or even a harmful technology.

Non-studied apps: good, bad, or evil?

One of the recent studies discovered that the use of fitness trackers and calorie-counting apps can exacerbate eating disorders — increasing eating concerns and triggering dietary restraints.

So who do we believe?

NHS-accredited apps is a library for apps that have been developed and studied for the healthcare system. This group of apps are put together claiming to help patients with many conditions. These conditions include disorders such as bipolar disorder, bulimia nervosa, and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).

Who tests the testers?

Meaning how do we check for validity?

These tests were found to be of questionable efficiency. These apps had no scientifically reviewed data to prove they are indeed helping patients with depression or anxiety caused by mental health disorders.

Other research.

Another research, also touching upon the currently available apps for mental health, concluded that there is a significant gap. App vendors, the scientific community, and clinical stakeholders do not all match in their outcomes.

Lack of consistency in outcomes hurts all areas of healthcare.

This lack of collaboration in the creation of apps causes a stopgap in the system. Some claim to relieve the symptoms of complex psychological conditions. This will harm every party involved.

The proof.

Without solid proofs of efficiency, the resulting product can’t be openly suggested to anyone who may need it. This makes the situation where the user base won’t grow as fast as it could and should.  Providers won’t get improvements in patients’ health results. Patients certainly won’t be able to use reliable mobile self-management tools.

On top of that, even when the study is conducted, an app still can go under fire.

The case of Natural Cycle app causing unwanted pregnancies.

93 percent isn’t good enough when you are looking at a pregnancy.

Natural Cycles is the mobile app for non-hormonal and non-intrusive female birth control. The app uses algorithms that determine a woman’s fertility status. The app analyzes a user’s basal body temperature in combination with cycle length, sperm survival.

Supposedly?

The app “supposedly” helps identify the ovulation day, length of follicular and luteal phases. The app suggests on red and green days for having unprotected sex. Natural Cycles’ creators claim is that this app’s efficiency is comparable with traditional birth control methods.

IF the app actually worked — it would be great.

But something like a birth control method has to have a a much higher proof rate. proving it with the largest study of natural birth control methods. Still, even the app creators also admit the need for more research following their largest study of natural birth control methods. In January 2018, over 37 unwanted pregnancies among the Natural Cycles’ users at a major Swedish hospital.

The app’s co-founder Elina Berglund initiated an internal investigation to find out that the algorithm’s efficacy rate stayed within the declared 93 percent.

It’s not fun at all to see that there are unwanted pregnancies. This case got a loud public outcry because the efficiency of a birth control app is quite easy to track — and the cost of failing is obvious too. Natural Cycles’ developers made “hard to see through” (ambitious).

But the product turned out not to be perfect for everybody, what a surprise.

The app creators made everything in their power to ensure credibility — they have put science in the center of their product, researched its efficiency, and also presented results to create trust in gaining their user base.

Now, let’s think again about all those thousands of applications that enter the market with ZERO proven research put into their creation.

The roadmap to proven mobile health expertise

Basically, if we won’t be able to find out which apps really bring value to patients and providers, all new mHealth applications will be the waste of time and effort on ineffective or even harmful products.

To avoid it, the first step should be establishing collaboration between clinical stakeholders, developers, and scientific community.

As Bond University researchers noted, app development researchers should also share information and their findings with each other in order to “reduce research waste and prevent re-invention of wheels.”

In the future, we expect more systematic reviews, pre-release studies, and independent researches with larger user bases and focus groups.

Upon the release, patient feedbacks should be gathered to avoid negative influence and ensure positive health outcomes. If these steps are taken, we can hope to see mobile health become an integral part of the care delivery cycle.

The post It’s 2018, and We Still Have No Idea If Mobile Healthcare Apps Work appeared first on ReadWrite.

On first hearing the term ‘image analysis’, it’s easy to think immediately of software that can identify objects in photographs. But while static image analysis is a vital application of computer vision, and one that offers immense value, it’s only a part of a bigger picture.

For marketers in particular, some of the most compelling use cases are centered on analyzing the living and breathing consumer, in order to improve marketing performance (and its measurement), create stronger personal connections between customers and brands, and reduce costs.

This article explores some marketing use cases for real-time visual analysis of people, along with the ones that involve analyzing photographic images. Each of these use cases offers direct benefits to brand owners and creative agencies by way of improved performance measurement, reduced costs, and the creation of more personalized, engaging experiences for consumers.

Making Marketing More Personal

Computer vision and image analysis technologies may have a way to go before they can even come close to the human levels of visual perception, but a fair degree of accuracy is already possible in certain scenarios, such as visual analysis of gender and age groups. That’s a level of precision sufficient to make new inroads into marketing personalization.

The McDonalds burger empire is just one enterprise investigating this marketing approach. The fast-food giant has plans to open self-service kiosks equipped with cameras and image analysis software. The kiosks will use computer vision to identify customers by their gender and approximate age and then recommend menu items based on this visual data.

Personalized Window Shopping

Aside from McDonalds, other retail companies are working with computer vision consultants and developers to increase personalization through image analysis. Camera-equipped screens in storefronts will soon be capturing and analyzing data about passers-by—or perhaps more specifically, window-shoppers.

When a window shopper stops to check out the screen displays, she will see the content change to show the items or products that the software perceives as relevant to that individual based on the analyzed visual data. In an apparel store, for example, a window-shopper may see images of garments that complement what she is wearing. Could there be any better way of grabbing window shoppers’ attention and turning them into impulse buyers?

Understanding Consumer Attention and Sentiment

Brand owners will soon be able to use image analysis to capture improved metrics about how advertising is perceived by viewers. Again, while the technology may not yet be sensitive enough to recognize all the subtleties of facial expressions and body language, computer vision can certainly discern between a smile, a blank expression or a frown.

This type of analysis can be a game-changer for enterprises wishing to assess TV and video advertising effectiveness. The conventional way to gather such information is via surveys, in which ad viewers express their sentiments about the content they see. The weakness of this approach though, is simply that humans are notoriously unreliable when it comes to articulating their impressions.

Smiles Don’t Lie

The reality of survey fallibility was evidenced when one particular advertisement, the subject of a 2016 study by Omnicom Media Group, was ranked 55^th out of 63 advertisements on the 2016 USA Today Ad Meter List. That result was based on viewers’ stated opinions. However, the ad was then shown to a sample of viewers, whose emotional responses were measured using facial image analysis. The findings belied the USA Today ranking, as the ad raised more smiles among the viewers than did other productions ranked much higher on the Ad Meter list.

The takeaway from this study is that the capture of viewers’ spontaneous emotional reactions can provide more accurate data than self-reporting, at least when it comes to gauging the impact of audio-visual advertising. While it may not yet be clear how and where to utilize image analysis for this purpose, the possibilities are being taken seriously and it’s likely that the technology will soon become an important source of marketing performance data.

Accurate Analysis for Outdoor Advertising

Of all traditional methods of advertising, outdoor ads represent the only format still enjoying growth in terms of spending. In 2017, out-of-home advertising sales rose by 2.7%, according to the data from the Outdoor Advertising Association of America.

The gradual transformation of outdoor signage from static to dynamic digital displays is with no doubt helping to maintain public interest in this advertising format. The only problem with signs and billboards though, is the absence of clicks that can be counted to measure advertising performance.

All-Seeing Signage

Indeed, online marketing offers an infinitely greater degree of performance feedback than outdoor advertising, but image analysis could be the breakthrough to level this particular playing field. Small, inexpensive cameras mounted on or close to an outdoor signage, integrated with image analysis applications, could become the source of feedback on a range of performance factors, including:

• How many people walked past the ad signage
• How many people stopped to look at the advertisement
• How long people spent looking at the advertisement
• Demographics (such as age and gender) of people who stopped to look at the signage

According to a Marketing Land article, this outdoor equivalent of tracking click-through rates has already been deployed in tests by creative agencies such as M&C Saatchi, who believe it can support advertisers in making outdoor signage even more dynamic, perhaps enabling them to make real-time changes in the displayed content based on audience response.

No Time-Consuming Tagging

Another benefit that marketing teams might receive from image analysis is a reduction in the workload associated with displaying products on ecommerce websites. It currently takes plenty of effort to publish product images, since every image must be made identifiable by means of tags.

For many ecommerce enterprises, image tagging can add up to a substantial amount of time and therefore labor costs. It can also present semantic challenges for consumers when they search for products. By enabling visual search tools based on the deep learning technology, digital marketers will no longer need to assign text-based tags manually to product images, and consumers will no longer need to struggle to find the right words for their searches.

Seeing Beyond Semantics

As image analysis programs can scan images and identify not only the contents but also the context, visual searches powered by image analysis will allow online shoppers to search for products by selecting or uploading images similar to the items they wish to find. This is especially useful for products with subjective descriptions, which might be labeled with any out of a range of tags, depending on the jargon used by the merchant.

Ultimately then, this particular use case of image analysis will offer the double benefit of making searches easier for shoppers to conduct, and reducing the costs involved in creating and maintaining online product catalogs.

Image Analysis: A New Dimension in Data-Driven Marketing

The image analysis use cases described in this article are exciting. They may also be but a few of the more obvious possibilities awaiting marketers who set foot into this new dimension of physical/digital interaction.

In the same way that technologies like augmented reality, sensors, and beacons have blurred the lines between ecommerce and traditional retail, so cameras and image analysis may now play a similar role in merging digital and traditional forms of advertising media (which, let’s face it, are largely visual) to create a new landscape for data-driven marketing.

Time will tell if its influence will be that revolutionary, but it does seem likely that image analysis will reshape the way brands strengthen their identities, heighten consumer awareness, and attract new followers—all while measuring performance more accurately and reaching new levels of cost efficiency.

The post Real-time Image Analysis in Marketing: Some Exciting Use Cases appeared first on ReadWrite.

Software performance testing is vital for determining how a system will perform under various loads and conditions. Performance testing does not seek to identify defects or bugs but instead measures performance in relation to benchmarks and standards. It helps developers identify and diagnose bottlenecks. Once bottlenecks are identified and mitigated, it’s possible to increase performance.

Performance testing differs from functional testing, which focuses on individual functions of the software. This includes interface testing, sanity testing, and unit testing. More or less, testers check to ensure that functions are carried out properly and serve their purpose.

Performance testing, on the other hand, tests the readiness and overall performance of the software and the hardware it runs on. As such, performance testing is typically conducted after functional testing.

Ultimately, poor performance can drive users and customers away. In its turn, sound performance testing will help you identify areas for improvement.

5 Essential Aspects of Performance Testing

It’s important to identify and test several performance aspects of the software under load. Doing so will help you detect bottlenecks and other potential issues. Let’s examine five of the most commonly tested metrics.

Load Testing: it examines how a system performs as the workload increases. Workload can refer to the volume of conducted transactions or concurrent users under normal working conditions. Load testing also measures response time.

Soak Testing: also known as endurance testing, soak testing is an assessment of how the software performs over an extended period of time under a normal workload. This test is used to identify system problems, such as issues with database resource utilization or log file handles.

Scalability Testing: it tests software performance under gradual increases in workloads, or changes in resources, such as memory, under a stable workload.

Stress Testing: it measures how a system will perform outside of normal working conditions. For example, how will the system respond when faced with more transactions or concurrent users than intended? This helps to measure its stability and enable developers to identify a breaking point. Stress testing also allows developers to see how the software recovers from failure.

Spike Testing: this is a specific type of stress testing that demonstrates the software response when this software is repeatedly hit with large, quick increases in load.

Performance Testing Step by Step

Most of your time is going to be spent planning the test rather than running it. Once you run the test, most of the work is handled by the hardware. Of course, after results are generated, you’ll have to analyze the output. Now let’s examine the performance testing process step by step.

Identify the Test Environment

To get started, you’ll need to identify the physical test environment, including hardware and network configurations. You’ll also need to have the software set up. By understanding the test environment and matching it as closely as possible to real-world conditions, the test itself will be more accurate and provide better insights.

Know Your Performance Acceptance Criteria

You should know what goals you want to reach. This means determining the acceptable levels of response time, resource utilization, and throughput. Also, consider various configurations that could affect performance.

Plan and Design Tests to Identify Key Scenarios

Next, you need to identify key scenarios based on the anticipated real-world use. Different users will generate different demands. It’s important to account for as many of them as possible by determining variability among representative users. Once variability is determined, it’s important to simulate the conditions and to test the performance correspondingly.

Configure the Test Environment

Now it’s time to revisit the test environment and to set up the monitoring structure. This step will be highly dependent on your software, hardware, and other factors. Review your work to make sure there are no errors.

Execute the Test and Gather Data

Once the test is set up, it’s up to your hardware and software to carry it out. Make sure you gather data and closely observe the test as it unfolds.

Digest the Results

In a sense, the real work doesn’t begin until the performance test is completed. Once you’ve gathered data, you’ll need to analyze the results. Pay attention to bottlenecks, critical failures and any abnormalities. Also, run the test again to ensure that performance is consistent.

Some Best Practices to Keep in Mind

When setting up your test environment, you need to consider how your software will perform in the real world. Take into account the variety of devices and client environments, such as different web browsers, that will be used to access your software. Also, don’t start your test from the boot-up as most people will be using your platform while it is already under load.

Further, set a baseline for user experience. Performance data is vital. However, the most important question is “how satisfied are the users?” Understand how decreasing performance will detrimentally impact them.

Conclusion: Be Ready to Start Over

Once the first round of the test is completed, you’ll be able to identify potential bottlenecks and other issues. These problems should be addressed. This may mean changing hardware or rewriting code, among other things.

However, every time something is changed, it’s important to conduct another performance test to see if results have improved. By doing so, it’s possible to incrementally improve and maximize the performance of the software and corresponding hardware.

The post Performance Testing: Essentials, Process, and Best Practices appeared first on ReadWrite.

Technology in Football: Yes or No? It’s one of the biggest talking points today. While supporters of the tech innovations suggest that technology would significantly reduce referees’ errors, thus stopping injustices, some people believe that it would ruin the charm of the game.

“It’ll kill the football spirit!” the critics say. Tell that to England fans, who still mourn the shocking refereeing decision when Frank Lampard’s goal in the World Cup 2010 was wrongfully disallowed.

I’m not sure if the charm of a football game would be ruined, but I’m quite sure that refereeing mistakes, such as disallowed goal, destroy the enjoyment. By declaring that we just need better match officials, we’re not allowing real innovation to enter the sport. Frankly speaking, we have seen mistakes so many times (choose among many on YouTube) not to give innovations a leap of faith.

Injustices are the most important reason why we see more and more use of technology in sports. And this is exactly what awaits us with an exciting summer of football ahead of us. As FIFA World Cup 2018 in Russia is kicking off, we are witnessing the usage of various technological tools which are set to provide additional support to referees and give extra information to the teams.

The tournament has a number of technical innovations in play alongside the teams. For the first time in World Cups, we will see the use of VAR (Video Assistant Referee) which is supposed to help referees with decisions regarding goals, red cards, penalties and mistaken identity – these are multi-million dollar decisions that were left wide open to interpretation until now. With goal-line technologies, such as Hawk-Eye and Goal Ref, being used only for the second World Cup, it is clear that football is utilising technology more than ever before in its long history.

How does VAR work?

1. The VAR recommends to the referee that an incident happened or referee asks for VAR’s help.
2. VAR reviews video of an incident and advises the referee.
3. Referee decides to rely on the information from the VAR or decides to review the video footage himself on the sideline before making their decision.

We have already seen VAR technology at work in English FA Cup, but the World Cup will be the ultimate test. According to FIFA, VAR will be used as an additional tool for referees to “correct clear and obvious errors and missed incidents in clearly defined match-changing decisions”. If it works well, it might mark the beginning of a technology era in football, as the possibilities are enormous.

What are the possibilities with the Internet of Things?

The Internet of Things (IoT) technology is a crucial element of generating innovative experiences and advances in the modern world. Accordingly, it is going to completely revolutionise any sport for players, coaches, event organisers and supporters over the coming decade. Together with the machine learning and the artificial intelligence, referees’ errors could be cut down to zero. So, no more refereeing mistakes, touchline oversights or goal-line blunders. Developments such as the Adidas ‘smart ball’ already indicate how this type of technology can be used to give players an instant feedback on how they strike the ball.

So, how does it work? For starters, sensors connected to an IoT Platform collect the data. The IoT Platform processes it in real time, notifying referee when anomalies or events of interest are detected (like ball crossing the goal line), without the need to interrupt the game. The IoT Platform also stores an extensive amount of data coming from the sensors, creating the flawless statistics and enabling detailed analysis of the match after it’s over, including team performance.

The IoT sets an endless variety of possibilities, and I’ll list some of them:

• Outs & Goals: Sensors in a ball could recognise if the ball is out of the field or if it crossed the goal line, and alarm the referee.
• Offsides: Sensors in players’ boots and the ball could reveal if ‘offside’ really occurred. With the help of the data about position of the ball, player’s feet and the position of offensive and defensive players, artificial intelligence could deduce if it was an offside or not.
• Foul plays: Artificial intelligence would be responsible for determining if there was a foul or not on the basis of the movement of a fouled player’s foot and the position of an opposite player’s feet.
• Foul position: The same principle would be used to determine where exactly the foul occurred and if it was a penalty or not.

Other than that, sensors could also help make football safer, meaning far fewer casualties, both among players and spectators. IoT-enabled sensors placed in wearables will ensure that stadium officials and police accurately track, analyse and manage movements of huge groups of spectators to avoid any overcrowding, thus reducing the risk of Hillsborough disaster happening ever again. On the pitch, sensors embedded in clothing or wearables are able to monitor players’ heart patterns; the IoT Platform immediately notifies club doctors if it detects anything out of the ordinary. This could help prevent tragedies such as the heart attack suffered by Fabrice Muamba, Bolton Wanderers midfielder, during a match in 2012. Despite making a full recovery, he was never able to play football again.

Let me finish with a conclusion – if your team is denied a penalty in Moscow this summer, I believe you’ll be happy with the additional check via new technologies. Even though it sounds like they might dehumanise football, chances for an unfair outcome are lower than ever.

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