SerraView

It has been proven over and over that human beings perform better in natural sunlight in all facets of their lives. Without natural light, our body’s rhythm gets out of synch and can eventually lead to health problems. The problem is, on average, people spend only roughly 10% of their days outside…not nearly enough to get the proper amount of natural light.

SerraView is currently developing smart daylighters that will fasten to normal windows in the same way a regular set of window shades or blinds would, but perform significantly more complex tasks. According to the product description, “Serraview harvests daylight from outside by redirecting it upward and deep into the interior of the room; providing illumination which is then diffused downward for higher levels of natural, glare-free, full spectrum lighting. All while preserving the all-important views out the window.”

There is an autonomous sun tracking system that rotates the slats to increase levels of lighting indoors. It makes adjustments according to the sun’s elevation in the sky. Additionally, a mobile application can be used to make manual adjustments to the slats as well as provide data regarding sunlight intake.

More information about SerraView can be found here on Kickstarter.

MICA Bracelet

Fashion Matters to MICA! Most wearable technology is primarily designed to provide functionality and utility to consumers, but Intel had a bit of a different idea for their new smart bracelet, known as MICA. MICA (My Intelligent Communications Accessory) will be a fashion-forward wearable device that is made with snake skin, stones and pearls, but is also an extraordinarily advanced piece of technology.

MICA comes standard with an AT&T Sim card, as well as SMS and data streaming capabilities for the first two years at no additional cost. For a small (hah!) price of $495.00, you can wear a bracelet that can access 3G radio, navigate you to destinations by integrating itself with TomTom, interface with Yelp on the go, all from a sleekly designed bracelet on your wrist.

To prevent an overwhelming amount of notifications and whatnot from coming through the device, you can filter out who and what pings your MICA. That way, wearing this device is purely useful to you, and not a nuisance at any point. You can preset text messages that are pre-loaded into the device (all controlled from software on the computer). This. thing. rocks. Oh, and I forgot to mention that it has a 48 hour battery life give or take a few hours depending on your usage.

It will be exclusively sold at Barney’s entering this Christmas season. More information about MICA can be found here on Intel’s website: Intel.com

Ring: Smart Doorbell

My house is pretty big. My room is very far from the front door, and I can’t stand having to get off my couch and walk all the way downstairs just to open the door for my friend. Yeah, I’m lazy, so what? Doesn’t matter anymore, because Ring exists.

The Ring Video Doorbell is a smart doorbell that is connected to your smartphone through a mobile application. Anyone who approaches your home can now ring your doorbell, but rather than just a chime playing in the foyer of your house, the mobile app on your phone receives a notification and you can “answer your door” from anywhere. Since the doorbell features an HD camera equipped with night vision, you have the ability to receive a clear image of who is at your door at any time.

While you’re away on vacation, the doorbell will continuously record any motion that it recognizes and send it to a cloud server. Ring is not only a convenience-based smart object: If for whatever reason your home gets broken into, it also acts as an additional security measure to protect you and your family. Recordings can be viewed at any time to determine who has been to your home.

Installation is simple, the batteries are easily rechargeable, and it can be hooked up to pre-existing doorbell wirings.

Ring only costs $199 and is currently available for pre-order on ring.com.

Navdy 3

Do You Feel Like You’re Driving In the Future? Not yet, you don’t. But you can if you choose to pre-order what I consider to be one of the coolest new smart devices out there! I would like to introduce you to Navdy.

Navdy is a smart device designed to provide drivers with relevant information at a quick glance, while also allowing them to respond to that information with voice and touch-less gesture controls. It basically projects a HUD (heads up display) about 2 meters in front of the driver’s side of the windshield that can be interacted with constantly while driving.

Some of the features of Navdy include:

• Turn-by-turn directions
• Displays current vehicle information such as MPH, RPM, fuel efficiency
• Safe display of text messages or other mobile phone notifications
• Accept and initiate calls without touching your mobile phone
• Play, pause, and skip music

Watch this hilarious video from the creators of Navdy to learn more about the product and see it work in real-time!

High Tech Hotel

Do you love traveling? If you do or even if you don’t, you may have encounter that exciting moment when you walk into a hotel room with a little nerve-wracking anticipation at the back of your mind about how the hotel room will looks or feels like.

Technological innovations is gravitating towards the hotel industry as they aim to make your hotel stay feels more like home. From choosing the types of wake up calls you will receive to making a request for pillows or a toothbrush with one touch, technology aims to revolutionize the way you feel staying in a hotel. Experts working on this project commented:

Welcome to today’s hotels, driven by the Internet-of-things technology, allowing it to personalize guests’ experiences. As far as it has come, it is still evolving to create an even more customized experience over the next few years.

That’s just the beginning of this high-tech hotel experience; when you leave your room, the corridors ring with the sound of crowing roosters in the morning—and hooting owls at night. Full article here.

Image via Jcress.com

This may seems a little unusual at first but almost all of the new technological inventions seems unusual when we first heard of them. As hotels are constantly fighting new competitors like airbnb, it is interesting to note that they are planning to create a competitive advantage with hopes to attract more guests passed their front doors.

What do you think about this upcoming high-tech hotel experience? Do you think they will make you feel more or less like home?