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Beauty Now in the Eye of the Algorithm

9:26 PM , Posted in , , ,

New image recognition technology judges photographic aesthetics.
    New technology from Xerox can sort photos not just by their content but also according to their aesthetic qualities, such as which portraits are close-in and well-lit, or which wildlife shots are least cluttered.
Still in the prototype stage, the technology could eventually help with tasks like choosing which of hundreds of digital photos taken on a family vacation should appear in a photo album. It could help stock agencies sort photos by their characteristics, and it could be deployed inside a camera to help people delete lower-quality scenes quickly, saving on storage space and hassle.
"What they show is that now you don't need a human to select images that are going to be judged beautiful," says Aude Olivia, an associate professor of brain and cognitive sciences at MIT, who also works on image recognition. "You can run the algorithm, and it will give a good estimate."
The technology—developed at the Xerox Research Center Europe in Grenoble, France—is slated for beta testing with Xerox corporate partners next year, says Craig Saunders, manager of the computer vision research group there. These partners include graphic design firms, online photo-book companies, and stock agencies, all of which might want new ways to sort and find photos.
The Xerox system learns about quality photography by studying photos that had previously been chosen for public display in online photo albums, such public ones shown on Facebook, or photos tagged as high quality on Flickr. Then it notes common characteristics of these photos.
Not surprisingly, these characteristics often correspond to what experts already understand about good photographs. The best portraits of people, for example, have indirect lighting and blurry or monochromatic backgrounds that help keep the focus on the person. Good beach photos often include silky-looking waves, a trick achieved through slow shutter speeds. And many kinds of photos are appealing because they follow the "rule of threes," with subjects divided among three zones in the photo. "We try to learn what it is about these features that makes photos 'good,'" says Saunders. (Examples and demonstrations can be found here.)

Reference: Technology Review.com

How much power Google consumes

9:21 PM , Posted in , , ,


The giant of the web Google revealed its energy use for the first time.

Google is the first web firm to reveal how much energy it consumes, this information will help researchers understand how the massive explosion of Internet consumption and cloud computing is contributing to global energy consumption.

Google consumes 260 million watts continuously across the world,the company reported on Wednesday. This is equivalent to the power used by all the houses in Richmond, Virginia, or Irvine, California (around 200,000 houses), and nearly a quarter of the output of a standard nuclear power plant.


Until now, the most of Google's energy use is tied up in its data storage centers, according to Jonathan Koomey who is a professor at Stanford University and a researcher who focuses on energy and IT. He says that nearly 220 million of these watts are used only by the company's data centers, based on figures Google showed him . Most of this energy is used in cooling data center systems. Google custom builds many data centers, for example a new one in Finland that uses a seawater cooling system, to cool the system.

This has made Google to be relatively energy efficient, says Koomey, who estimates that the company owns about 3 percent of servers worldwide and uses only 1 percent of electricity for data centers worldwide. "They're operating more efficiently than other data centers," he says.

In its report, Google compares the energy usage of companies' in-house computer systems to the energy used by its cloud servers. It estimates that running Gmail instead of an in-house e-mail system can be almost 80 times more efficient .Google says that 25 percent of its energy was generated by renewable fuels, from wind farm in 2011, and plan to increase that to 30 percent this year.



Sherif Akoush, a researcher at the University of Cambridge who studies IT energy consumption, indicates that Google could be even more energy efficient, and notes that the company's environmental works will continue to rise. "Google tackles this problem mainly by using power purchase agreements from green sources, which offset basically the emissions from its data centers," says Akoush. Instead, "it should just try to apply more radical solutions like green energy and be a zero-carbon company instead of pumping waste then trying to clean it up."

Bruce Nordman who is a researcher at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, notes that most IT-related energy usage occurs from homes and offices, and not major data centers.

Google says that an average search uses .3 watt-hours of electricity. But Nordman points out that cutting back on Google searches is not going to save a significant amount of energy. "Something like having your display go to sleep a little faster would probably save more energy," he says.
He adds, "since there's more consumption [in homes and offices], there's potentially more savings and yet that's not what gets the attention."


technologyreview.com

Gmail’s new look

3:49 AM , Posted in


Back in July we showed you a preview of Gmail's new look, and we’ve been working this summer to make even more updates and improvements. Today, we’re giving you an in-depth look at the new design. If you like what you see, over the next few days you’ll be able to switch to the new look by clicking on Switch to the new look in the bottom-right of Gmail.


Streamlined conversations
Conversation view has been completely redesigned to help you read through your email threads. You’ll now see profiles pictures for your contacts, so it’s easier to keep track of who said what. We also stripped out as much as possible so you can focus on communicating with your friends and colleagues.


Elastic density
We know that you use Gmail from a variety of screen sizes and devices, so now the spacing between elements on the screen will automatically change based on the kind of display you’re using. If you prefer a denser view all the time, you can change your density manually in the Settings menu.


New HD themes
Themes have been completely rebuilt to enable us to bring you a new set of beautiful high resolution themes with imagery provided by iStockphoto. We've updated most of the old favorites as well and your theme will be automatically carried over to the new look. Go to the Settings menu to take another look at themes and choose the one that fits you best.


Smarter navigation
The navigation panel on the left keeps your labels and chat contacts in view at all times. It's also more customizable: you can resize the labels and chat areas if you want to see more, or hide the chat area entirely via the chat icon in the lower left. You can also use the arrow keys to navigate around the interface.


Better search
Click the dropdown in the search box to see a new advanced search panel, which makes it easier and faster to find exactly what you're looking for. You can use the same panel to create a filter from any search in just a few clicks.


We’re excited to finally share Gmail’s new look with you. We’ll be bringing these changes to everyone soon, but if you’d like to make the switch right away, we’re rolling out a Switch to the new look link in the bottom-right of Gmail over the next few days.

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