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04 February 2019

Yesterday

CES 2019 Part 2

Staying Alive

Even more significant than the remarkable food and beverage offerings were those promoting improved health, some in quite bizarre and often entertaining ways. It has not escaped entrepreneurial notice that we are aging, and preventing or ameliorating the perils of senility are a substantial subgroup of products and software.

This is one I might have invented myself. I've never really liked teeth, and when comparing the cost of dentistry vs. melt-in-your-mouth chocolate, guess which comes out ahead?

I do understand, though, that there are reasons to maintain ones dental viability, and this product would seem to be ideal from a time-management viewpoint.

Apparently the way it functions is that you put this thing in your mouth, it cleans your teeth, and after a prescribed time period you remove it. No "brushing" required.

I didn't investigate how the UI (if it even has one) works. It may involve pressing a button

My notes, which are mostly the captions of the pictures, failed to jog my memory on this one. It appears to be a device that allows you to become a "zen master" and, as it points out, "Enjoy the benefits of breathing..."

Although you often read about the benefits of brushing, I guess breathing has no organized lobby like the ADA. Until now we were on our own.

Assuming you're breathing, this Liveness Detection system will presumably be able to verify same. I don't believe the companies are related, though.

(I think the point of this is for security to prevent checkpoint cameras from accepting pictures instead of living, breathing humans.)

On a more serious note, this is a prototype home blood test machine. No printed specs, but presumably it will measure cholesterol, glucose, and do some other tests that don't require excessively delicate chemistry.

Not that I don't enjoy my annual trip to the phlebotomist, but devices like this will be getting better, faster, and cheaper, pick all three. Home diagnosis has to be the future of health care.

Falling is a big problem for seniors, who tend to be fragile. Two products. from shoes to glasses, alert (someone else — presumably the faller is aware) that a fall has occurred.

How AI is it Really?

I'm sure you find Artificial Intelligence to be interesting, beguiling, and, perhaps, scary, as many do. I personally fail to be scared, but then I'm not worried about losing my job or becoming one with the Grey Goo. I do suffer beguilement to the extent that I made a point of checking out as many exhibits as I could that claimed to be demonstrating some aspect of AI in the products on offer.

I'm skeptical. Samsung had a television set that "Analyzes scenes in real time and maximizes the sense of immersion with three-dimensional sound using multi-channel speakers." Another company had a "Frame T"V powered by AI. And Yamaha had a piano(!) with AI. Perhaps I'm wrong to be skeptical, and perhaps there's something numinous going on in these products and others making the AI claim, but to me it seems less miraculous than it does buzzwordish.

Richard Factor

NP:

"Keep the Customer Satisfied"

Simon and Garfunkle

ToTD

The Phoenix (Arizona) National Hockey League team is styled "The Coyotes." Despite my proximity to Phoenix, I've never seen them and have no idea how I got the shirt.

Don't they play hockey on ICE? What are these Coyotes doing in Phoenix?

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