Power

Apple wants to make your tablet see-through

Plus, Microsoft listening to your calls, Google reading your social media posts, Facebook reading your thoughts and other patents from big tech.

Aziz Ansari and Chris Pratt sitting at a bar

If the Gryzzl tablet is good enough for "Parks & Recreation," it's good enough for us.

Photo: Courtesy of NBC

This week, big tech is acutely interested in knowing more about you to better serve you ads and finding zany new ways of displaying you those ads and more, from curved VR glasses to transparent displays to car seats that turn into screens. If we ever get to go outside again, some of these patents may well be the foundation for some of the tech we use. But if not, at least Amazon's new patent on computer vision will help keep out the people we don't want in our homes.

And remember: The big tech companies file all kinds of crazy patents for things, and though most never amount to anything, some end up defining the future.

Alphabet

Figuring out which teams you like

How do you know if someone's a Red Sox fan? Don't worry; they'll tell you. Red Sox fans are some of the most vocal, fervent sports fans I've ever met, so I'm not sure Google's new patent would be all that necessary for them. But the gist is that a social network system would be able to infer interests and activities of a user based on where they are and what they post about. If they're based in Boston's Copley Square and post about the Sox, it's highly likely they know where the Green Monster is. The system would then know to tailor its advertising to a Boston-based Sox fan — perhaps they're in the mood for a nice pair of red socks, or a second baseman?

Curved displays for VR glasses

Most VR headsets today rely on flat displays and lenses to immerse the wearer in a virtual world, but if the display actually wrapped around their head, it might feel a little more real. Google's patent for "non-planar displays" would aim to do just that. The patent also draws out a pretty snazzy-looking design for what these future headsets could even look like.

Turning down your keyboard lights when it's time for bed

Most smartphones and computers have software to adjust the color temperature of the screen to be a little softer on the eyes at nighttime, which studies suggest can make it easier to fall asleep after a long screen-time session. But many devices also have backlit keyboards now, which tend to just produce their own blinding shade of white light when turned on. Google's patent outlines a system that would adjust the temperature and color of the lights on those keys in much the same way that screens now dim. It won't stop parents from saying their kids' phones are the reason they're staying up all night, though.

Amazon

Using computer vision to let strangers and robots into your house

Amazon already has a system that can use cameras and smart locks to let people into your home for things like package deliveries, but its new patent involves the system operating a little more autonomously. In the patent, the system could recognize that a home chef has arrived at your door to prepare you dinner (something we can obviously all relate to), or that a delivery robot is here to drop off a package, and let them in if it's safe. This could be determined by pinging that person (or robot) to make sure it's them, and then letting them know things about your house, like that you have a dog that might jump them when they step inside. Hopefully the system would know the difference between a licensed professional and a guy who just happens to own a chef's toque.

Apple

Transparent displays

Perhaps some day soon the trope from just about every sci-fi movie ever will become a reality. According to a new patent from Apple, the company is looking into displays that are either partially or entirely transparent. The patent suggests the displays could be found on any sort of device, including MacBooks or iPhones, and as you'd expect, they'd feature a bezel made of something opaque that would house all of the actual components to leave you with a large blank space to see through. This might be useful for some applications, like augmented reality, but is it something we'd actually want all the time? In movies, screens are often see-through so you can still see the actors on the other side.

Turning your car's back seat into a computer

Who needs a transparent display when your whole car can be a computer screen? Another patent from Apple this week sees the company exploring what infotainment systems in the back of vehicles (autonomous or otherwise) might look like. In the patent, a small center console could let a passenger choose to see whatever they're looking at — such as the map directions the car is following — blown up to cover the entire backseat area of the car. The materials used for the carseat, floor and doors would let light shine through, allowing them to turn into one massive computer screen. Stick a camera on the front of the car, and you could definitely see a future where someone makes a program where it looks like their backseat is a magic carpet flying along the expressway. It's a whole new world.


Facebook

Carbon nanotubes!

If you've followed any tech media over the last decade or so (including this jerk), you've likely been convinced that everything in the future will be made of carbon nanotubes. To date, that has not proven to be the case. But some companies are still looking at ways to use the difficult-to-produce super-materials, and apparently that includes Facebook. Its patent outlines an electrical connector made using nanotubes (and some less-futuristic materials), but whether we'll actually see things like these outside of a lab is another story.

Neuromuscular signal reader

Have you ever wished computers knew what you were going to ask them before you did? Personally I just wish they knew what I meant when I asked them things, which is apparently still too much for Siri. Facebook's new patent, likely stemming from its brain-computer interface work, looks to use electromyography sensors (which measure electrical signals in muscles) to figure out what you're typing while you're still typing it. This would theoretically give a computer more time to answer your question, as well as improve reaction times in video games. I just hope we get to a point soon that when I ask Siri to turn the lights off, she doesn't turn them on in a different room.

Microsoft

Listening to your phone calls to serve you ads

Have you ever heard the myth about Facebook listening in to your conversations and using the info to serve you ads? It's (almost certainly) not actually doing that, but what if someone else were? This new patent from Microsoft describes a VoIP system where conversations could be mined for words and phrases that could indicate something one of the speakers is interested in buying. Because who doesn't want their conversations about a truck they're looking at to be used for future marketing touch points?

Fintech

Judge Zia Faruqui is trying to teach you crypto, one ‘SNL’ reference at a time

His decisions on major cryptocurrency cases have quoted "The Big Lebowski," "SNL," and "Dr. Strangelove." That’s because he wants you — yes, you — to read them.

The ways Zia Faruqui (right) has weighed on cases that have come before him can give lawyers clues as to what legal frameworks will pass muster.

Photo: Carolyn Van Houten/The Washington Post via Getty Images

“Cryptocurrency and related software analytics tools are ‘The wave of the future, Dude. One hundred percent electronic.’”

That’s not a quote from "The Big Lebowski" — at least, not directly. It’s a quote from a Washington, D.C., district court memorandum opinion on the role cryptocurrency analytics tools can play in government investigations. The author is Magistrate Judge Zia Faruqui.

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Veronica Irwin

Veronica Irwin (@vronirwin) is a San Francisco-based reporter at Protocol covering fintech. Previously she was at the San Francisco Examiner, covering tech from a hyper-local angle. Before that, her byline was featured in SF Weekly, The Nation, Techworker, Ms. Magazine and The Frisc.

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FTA
The Financial Technology Association (FTA) represents industry leaders shaping the future of finance. We champion the power of technology-centered financial services and advocate for the modernization of financial regulation to support inclusion and responsible innovation.
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AWS CEO: The cloud isn’t just about technology

As AWS preps for its annual re:Invent conference, Adam Selipsky talks product strategy, support for hybrid environments, and the value of the cloud in uncertain economic times.

Photo: Noah Berger/Getty Images for Amazon Web Services

AWS is gearing up for re:Invent, its annual cloud computing conference where announcements this year are expected to focus on its end-to-end data strategy and delivering new industry-specific services.

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Donna Goodison

Donna Goodison (@dgoodison) is Protocol's senior reporter focusing on enterprise infrastructure technology, from the 'Big 3' cloud computing providers to data centers. She previously covered the public cloud at CRN after 15 years as a business reporter for the Boston Herald. Based in Massachusetts, she also has worked as a Boston Globe freelancer, business reporter at the Boston Business Journal and real estate reporter at Banker & Tradesman after toiling at weekly newspapers.

Image: Protocol

We launched Protocol in February 2020 to cover the evolving power center of tech. It is with deep sadness that just under three years later, we are winding down the publication.

As of today, we will not publish any more stories. All of our newsletters, apart from our flagship, Source Code, will no longer be sent. Source Code will be published and sent for the next few weeks, but it will also close down in December.

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Bennett Richardson

Bennett Richardson ( @bennettrich) is the president of Protocol. Prior to joining Protocol in 2019, Bennett was executive director of global strategic partnerships at POLITICO, where he led strategic growth efforts including POLITICO's European expansion in Brussels and POLITICO's creative agency POLITICO Focus during his six years with the company. Prior to POLITICO, Bennett was co-founder and CMO of Hinge, the mobile dating company recently acquired by Match Group. Bennett began his career in digital and social brand marketing working with major brands across tech, energy, and health care at leading marketing and communications agencies including Edelman and GMMB. Bennett is originally from Portland, Maine, and received his bachelor's degree from Colgate University.

Enterprise

Why large enterprises struggle to find suitable platforms for MLops

As companies expand their use of AI beyond running just a few machine learning models, and as larger enterprises go from deploying hundreds of models to thousands and even millions of models, ML practitioners say that they have yet to find what they need from prepackaged MLops systems.

As companies expand their use of AI beyond running just a few machine learning models, ML practitioners say that they have yet to find what they need from prepackaged MLops systems.

Photo: artpartner-images via Getty Images

On any given day, Lily AI runs hundreds of machine learning models using computer vision and natural language processing that are customized for its retail and ecommerce clients to make website product recommendations, forecast demand, and plan merchandising. But this spring when the company was in the market for a machine learning operations platform to manage its expanding model roster, it wasn’t easy to find a suitable off-the-shelf system that could handle such a large number of models in deployment while also meeting other criteria.

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Kate Kaye

Kate Kaye is an award-winning multimedia reporter digging deep and telling print, digital and audio stories. She covers AI and data for Protocol. Her reporting on AI and tech ethics issues has been published in OneZero, Fast Company, MIT Technology Review, CityLab, Ad Age and Digiday and heard on NPR. Kate is the creator of RedTailMedia.org and is the author of "Campaign '08: A Turning Point for Digital Media," a book about how the 2008 presidential campaigns used digital media and data.

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