Long standing fans of our F5 Live and its events will know that seeing a FIRST team at IBM Innovate 2014 was quite refreshing for Nick! FRC Team 1649 EMS was the center of attention for a PitStop Meetup hosted by Veronica Belmont. The team discussed its recent successes in the past two seasons of FIRST competitions and some of the members talked about their plans after high school, which include wanting to become an engineer. There is a lot of crossover between robotics and software development, and that point is really driven home by this panel.
A seat in a custom Jaguar F-Type led us to speaking with Sky Matthews about the connected car and the Internet of things. Expanding beyond just a buzzword from a few years ago, Matthews digs deep into what the future could hold for all connected devices around the planet. He also talks about the Jaguar and the potential of what it can do. From advanced notifications about traffic and weather conditions, to giving you real-time information about things happening inside your house or place of work, your car could have the potential to be just one of many devices providing you with useful information at all times.
[topcoder] has been around longer than most “Top” shows you might have seen on TV and in fact, has over 600,000 people signed up to the site from all over the world. Their mission? To compete in challenges in different aspects of software design. The site also has a community aspect where members improve their skills, demonstrate and gain reward for their expertise, and provide the industry with objective insight on new and emerging technologies.
One of the cool things about topcoder is that the site launches challenges that require an extremely fast turnaround. So fast that they actually launched one during IBM Innovate 2014 that lasted only 22 hours. The task was to work with a Twitter data scraper to create beautiful and useful experience. Developers everywhere took this challenge head-on and the results of their efforts were very impressive!
Clinton Bonner from topcoder talks about all of that, as well as some really cool things the site’s members have created.
Meg Swanson, Marketing Director with IBM’s BlueMix cloud-based development platform, talks with us before the show floor opens for the day about BlueMix as a whole. She gives a brief overview and then gives a call to action for developers who might be interested to try out the software. In this segment, Swanson says that BlueMix has been really well received by almost everyone who has tried it, with IBM’s support team rapidly making requested features and changes available to developers based on dev feedback.
Gene Kim, former CTO of Tripwire, and author and researcher of “The Phoenix Project” was gracious enough to talk with us at IBM Innovate 2014, where he was a special guest and keynote speaker. Kim dives into a few different points of his reasons for being at Innovate, along with a couple of funny anecdotes and comparisons.
Kim also touches on the principles of developer operations and says that his passion is to turn horses into unicorns, something you have to listen to in order to understand what he means.
Nick talks with Sanjay Joshi with jStart Cloud Projects and Client Outreach – Emerging Technologies Software Group IBM. In this discussion, Joshi speaks on designing secure applications in IBM’s new platform-as-a-service, BlueMix.
Sanjay also touches upon some interesting projects he’s working on and things to watch for.
At IBM Innovate 2014 in Orlando, FL, the PLuGHiTz Live crew sit in and record a quick panel on information regarding cloud computing and the IBM platforms.
A team of experts discuss different aspects of the cloud, including things like security and deployment. The panel was hosted by celebrity tech enthusiast Veronica Belmont.
This week, the crew from F5 Live: Refreshing Technology are the guest bloggers. They cover the games and the geek culture side of CES! Stay tuned for the new Donald Trump Backer Level!
We’re well into the TPN.tv crowdfund program and it’s been great to see the outpouring of support from those who have already backed our team’s coverage of International CES 2014!
Nicholas DiMeo with the Frag Dolls at the Lenovo Party, CES ’13
I’m Nicholas DiMeo from F5 Live: Refreshing Technology, one of the shows attending CES as part of th Tech Podcast Network. A big shout-out goes out to each and every one of you who have already backed our endeavor this year. For those who are curious and want to know more about what TPN is and what we do each year in Vegas, I hope this update will further clarify our efforts and explains how our coverage increases in popularity with each apssing year.
Co-hosted by my very good friend Scott Ertz, F5 Live is a one-hour weekly broadcast about gadget, Internet, gaming and media news that is relevant to you. We break down the sometimes confusing and fast-paced world of technology to make it easy for anyone to know why a press release or change in policy matters. However, when we hit the floor of CES with our cameras, we’re looking for the most unique, clever and creative products and ideas and do our very best to showcase them to you.
Co-host Scott Ertz, interviewing Nox Audio at CES ’11
This year is no different as Eureka Park, the start-up section at CES, has expanded to over 200 entrepreneurs and startups and has taken over several halls in the Venetian hotel. Last year we had the most fun covering the up-and-coming products that we’re now seeing launch this holiday season, so it’s only more exciting to us that we’ll have more to look at this time around.
My team and I are also really amped to cover the debut of the Gaming Showcase TechZone in the South Hall. With all of the best press outlets in the world all in one space, the Consumer Electronics Associations has now given gaming manufacturers a permanent place to show off the latest trends, new gaming accessories and ground-breaking peripherals. With over 10,000 square feet dedicated to gaming and with companies like AMD, Logitech, Intel, Nvidia, Sony and Orbotix all in attendence, anyone from the casual gamer to the hardcore enthusiast will not want to miss out on TPN’s coverage this year. This is a new console launch year, which means consumers will need to decide whether to spend money on new hardware, keep what they have, or maybe look at their PC to simply upgrade that instead.
And this is why our CES coverage really is unmatched. A team of 20-plus with varied interests in the many different aspects that reside within the Consumer Electronics Show make up the perfect recipie for you, the consumer and viewer. All of it comes together to make sure you don’t miss a single thing and you’ll be able to make an informed decision to purchase or not by the people that are passionate about the group of products you’re seeing.
Nicholas DiMeo in his element, talking about headphones other sound equipment
That being said, we need your support. With your hard-earned dollars, you’ll become not only a financial backer in our efforts, but an integral part of our team. You’ll help us do what we absolutely love to do, which is covering cool tech products and to tell the world about them. If you’re still unsure about funding our team, I would encourage you to check out all of the updates from our other TPN team members.
You can also help by sharing this campaign with anyone who you might think would want to see the great coverage at TPN.tv. By using Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIN or even Google+, or by using the hashtags #crowdfund and #CESTPN, you’ll be helping us simply by spreading the word. If you’re already a backer, then I sincerely thank you for your support and I hope you enjoyed my insight into what I’m looking forward to this year at CES 2014. Stay tuned, because there’s more updates from us leading all the way to flying into Vegas.
Our founder of TPN, Todd Cochrane, resides in Hawaii and has always called our listeners and viewers our “Ohana,” Hawaiian for “family.” With this campaign, I look forward to welcoming each and every one of you into our Ohana, and together, TPN can continue our CES coverage for our family to enjoy.
If you prefer a video rendition of this post, albeit condensed, check this out.
Lastly, here’s one of my favorite interviews my team has done and is an excellent demonstration of the work we do here at TPN. You’ll see that down below the backer level update. I again thank you for your support and for reading my update.
We heard that Donald Trump’s team is reviewing all FundAnything projects and helping with some of them. Therefore, we added a special Trump backer level:
Right now we have plans to stay downtown to save a few $$. However, we would be more than happy to not only stay at Trump Towers, but also do some video at the Hotel/Casino. Interviews with staff and possibly yourself during CES.
You will also get hourly ads for Trump Towers (or another property of yours) during the live stream all week. Your ads will also be on post-produced content.
You will get 20 TPN @ CES T-shirts and personal podcast time with Jeffrey Powers and Todd Cochrane.
If you want to inquire about getting a special backer level made, Contact Todd.
Thanks to everyone that has backed our project so far!
Modular Robotics’ Cubelets in robot formA walk around Eureka Park at CES will always lead you to something new and exciting that will make you literally want to put your hands on it. Modular Robotics was no exception, as their namesake product allowed us to do just that. The company has created a line of blocks that all have little computer chips inside them that allow them to act and react to each other. Using blocks such as sensors, rollers, blinking lights, motors and more, you can build any type of creation you want, and then even program the blocks yourself to do things you want it to do. These cool gadgets are for ages 6-60 and are a great stocking stuffer or birthday present for anyone, young or old. You’ll want to see what we created in the video.
Luci, a solar-powered, inflatable, LED lantern by MPOWEREDMeet Luci. She’s an inflatable, portable, extremely lightweight, life-saving solar-powered LED lantern. Why life-saving? Well, for starters, for every lantern we purchase here, one Luci will be donated to a developing country to literally give them light. Founder and CEO of MPOWERED, Jacques-Philippe Piverger, talks about Luci and how she proved to be an effective tool not only during the power outages in NYC but even in developing countries that usually depend on dirty and costly fuel for energy. Luci has been such a success, in fact, that she’s reached the top spot in Amazon’s outdoor and camping category, after just only two months of being on shelves. It was really a pleasure talking to Jacques-Philippe as you could really feel the passion for his product and for the cause during the interview. It’s one of the many great things about Eureka Park at CES.
