Bleeding edge: the best of emerging tech

TechLife’s practical monthly roundup of emerging tech experiences, including all the latest virtual and augmented reality apps, alongside AI apps and other useful tools.

There’s no shortage of investment in the XR space with Facebook announcing a partnership with Ray-Ban to release its first pair of smart glasses and devs have already built a VR mod for the popular early access viking survival game Valheim. AI has its sights on skin cancer with an app that’ll classify multiple spots simultaneously and highlight the spots that should get follow up checks. If that wasn’t enough, the GPT-3 large language model is also being used by 300 commercial applications and is currently producing about as much content as 4.5 million professional writers would, on average, each day.

XR Facebook is partnering with Ray-Ban to make its first ‘smart’ glasses.

Oculus owner picks Ray-Ban to be wingman for its first smart glasses.

$TBC | facebook.com/RayBan/

Facebook CEO, Mark ‘smoked meats’ Zuckerberg, himself announced at the Facebook Connect conference that

Facebook’s first smart glasses would fly under a co-banner with Ray-Ban. The company did clarify in later statements that the glasses won’t have a display and won’t fit neatly under the AR banner. It did however, suggest that it was a step on the path to developing the full AR glasses that it refers to as Project Aria.

XR

Valheim VR

Awesome viking survival game gets VR compatibility.

$28.95 | valheimgame.com/

The immensely popular procedurally generated survival game

Valheim has received an unofficial VR mod that adds native VR compatibility for various headsets. The mod was posted on Nexus Mods by VHVR developer Brandon Mousseau. The

Minecraft- level graphics mean it shouldn’t be too taxing on your system and although you’ll still have to rely on your mouse and keyboard for controls, the mod includes an accessible suite of VR menus to interact with.

AI Guide dog backpack

AI backpack helps the visually impaired navigate autonomously.

$TBC | miraguidance.com/

Intel teamed up with researchers from the University of Georgia to create a backpack that gives guidance to the visually impaired. The AI-powered, voice-operated backpack connects to a forward facing bum bag with a camera to detect itts surroundings and point out any obstacles. In much the same way as autonomous vehicles the backpack uses visuals, depth fields, a GPS tracker and neural nets to recreate the world and describe it to the wearer.

AI

The Lost Tapes of the 27 Club

AI music helps encourage musicians to address mental health issues.

Free | losttapesofthe27club.com

The Lost Tapes of the 27 Club is an initiative hoping to raise awareness about the mental health of musicians by creating a set of AI generated songs that mimic a musician’s style to create the hits they could have produced if they lived longer. The music industry mental health non-profit Over The Bridge used an AI to create new hooks, melodies, rhythms and lyrics in the style of those produced by Jimmi Hendrix, Jim Morrison, Kurt Cobain, and Amy Winehouse, while an audio engineer used them to compose the album.

AI

AI melanoma detector

Smartphone-compatible skin cancer camera.

$NA | stm.sciencemag.org/content/13/581/eabb3652.abstract

MIT researchers have developed a machine-learning algorithm that can use smartphone images to screen for melanoma and other cancerous skin lesions. An article published in Science Translational Medicine details the deep convolutional network’s ability to assess multiple lesions at once and rank them in order of suspiciousness for more thorough assessment. The accuracy was assessed to be similar to that of tested board-certified dermatologists and can be used as a rapid screening tool for initial consultations.

AI

Project Gucciberg

This AI trap rapper reads Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland.

Free | projectgucciberg.mschfmag.com/ Project Gutenberg is an online free eBook library of over 60,000 books and literary collections that have been freed of copyright limitations and collated for the greater good; Project Gucciberg is a collection of unofficial audiobooks read by an AI trained to sound like rapper Gucci Mane. The project was created by US counter-culture magazine MSCHF, and seems not just ok with toeing the line on copyright infringement, but explicitly states that exploiting the unregulated area is the whole point, on the site.

AI

Google Maps adds 100 AI updates

New handy features make travel even easier.

Free | google.com/maps/about/#!/ Google Maps has received it’s biggest functional update in years, bringing 100 new AI improvements to the mapping and directions platform. Indoor directions, location weather and air quality, and eco-friendly routes are all coming to the local update, which will be rolled out worldwide over the coming months. We’re looking forward to not having to think about how rugged up you need to be before leaving the house, but there’s a heap of cool new features incoming.