Tag Archives: Memoto Camera

This week in lifelogging: Wearable tech revolution, Oakley’s new ski goggles and lifelogging insights

Revolutionizing our world with wearable tech

The wave of wearable tech gadgets seems to be bringing with it a new unlocking of possibilities – the propagation and development of brainwave technology, which is the ability to control our digital gadgets with our thoughts. One of the advantages of using brainwave technology is the opportunity to open more channels by which stroke patients can communicate. While some might argue that brainwave technology is not developed to the extent of replacing our traditional passwords with thought-based authentication, there exist an expanding base of players in this brainwave technology market. These include Muse by Interaxon, ZenTunes and MindWave. Perhaps technology will require near-zero effort from us in the future.

Oakley’s new ski goggles

Besides tech companies, many fitness equipment giants have also hopped onto this wave of wearable technology. Adding to that list is Mr. Oakley, who has recently offered some kind of Google Glass, carefully tailored for winter sportsmen, to provide jump analytics, altitude, vertical descent data, speed, various other information, as well as Bluetooth connectivity for pairing with your smartphone. Would you like an Oakley Airwave Snow, retailing at $599.95?

Lifelogging and memory

While there are many reasons for lifelogging, the most prominent one would probably manifest in some relation to our memory. In a study done by students from the Dublin City University investigating the reasons for lifelogging, it is said that some of us do it to reminisce, while others want to learn about an unknown early stage or simply to tell and pass down stories. This could stem from the fact that we, as humans, are simply wired to forget certain experiences that we wished we had remembered more vividly about. This week, we delved a little deeper into the reasons for memory lapses and found out that they occur as a necessity for consolidating information and memories in the brain. So, the next time you forget someone’s name, don’t be embarrassed. It’s all part of remembering it in future.

What is it about lifelogging and anonymity?

In an increasingly social world in terms of the number of social media platforms and the amount of time that users spend on them, it is no wonder that the sum of user-generated content is increasing at an exponential rate. Believe it or not, the inherent desire to lifelog has been a driving force behind the exploding amounts of user-generated content. Every one wants evidence of that particular experience that they had. Inevitably, some people begin to wonder if they could ever remain anonymous, especially when photos can now be automatically tagged using face recognition technologies. Watch the video by BBC Future below and let us know what you think!

Watch video here: Lifelogging: What it means for anonymity

Happy Earth Day!

Just this week on April 22nd, Earth Day was observed in hopes of gathering support for environmental issues. Here at Memoto, we would also like to take this chance to share the above time-lapse video of beautiful snippets around the Earth to remember this day. Feel free to share your Earth Day moments in the comments below!

More videos here: Celebrate Earth Day With These 10 Spectacular Time-Lapse Videos

If you enjoyed this post, please follow us on twitter and facebook! PS – Have you pre-ordered your Memoto Lifelogging Camera yet?

This week in lifelogging: Sleeker Google Glass, Lomography Smartphone Film Scanner and Memoto listed as one of the 33 hottest tech companies in Sweden

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Google Glass has a new, sleeker competitor from Japan

Several Japanese firms have collaborated to create this Google Glass twin – the Telepathy One. However, there are several key differences between them. For one, the Telepathy One uses a micro-projection unit instead of a tiny glass display. Telepathy One also places more focus on the ears rather than the eyes, as seen from the entire device being held in place by its in-ear ear buds. Would you purchase the Telepathy One as an alternative to Google Glass?

Smartphone scanner turns old negatives into digital Lomography copies

Got some film negatives buried under some well-archived treasure chest in your basement? Not sure what to do with them? This new Lomography Smartphone Film Scanner will take care of it. Simply turn the device on, insert your film, take a photo of it using your Smartphone and use your phone’s camera or the mobile app to edit and share. Bring the memories back!

Lifelogging – for you and your pet

Designing pet collars for the Memoto camera has been a top request. While not every one is a dog lover out there, we understand the interest. Although there are many reasons, it appears that quantifying one’s pet would provide a voice that its owners would actually understand. Thumbs up for a canine Memoto camera?

Maureen Lipman: If Memory Serves Me Right

In a bid to understand how memory works and if you can do anything to improve it, British actress and writer, Maureen Lipman, created a documentary “If Memory Serves Me Right.” Inspired by her own father who suffered from short-term memory losses, and fears of this happening to herself, Maureen Lipman interviewed memory experts and people who suffered from memory loss. Read more about what inspired her journey of personal and scientific discovery here; and if you live in the UK, you can watch the documentary here.

Memoto listed as 33 hottest tech companies in Sweden

This week Memoto won two awards, one for Nyteknik and Affärsvärldens “Sweden’s 33 hottest technology companies in 2013″ and the other for Veckans Affärers “Sweden’s 24 hottest entrepreneurs”. We wouldn’t have gotten there without your awesome support! A big thank you from the Memoto team.

This Week in Lifelogging: SXSW Takeaways, Samsung & Wearable Tech and Time-Lapse Videos

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Round-Up & Takeaways from SXSW

In concluding SXSW 2013 Accelerator Competition, one of the most emphasized themes was how there has been a gradual move from “Big Data” to “My Data”. At SXSW alone, we see an increase in the number of Quantified Self tools and wearable tech gadgets being made available, providing an indication of where we are heading – towards making technology work for us. For us at Memoto, besides soaking in the presence of the many Quantified Self tools and wearable tech gadgets, we took away 3 valuable lessons from SXSW and would like to share them with you. As a startup, we managed to gain a better insight into three aspects: connections, press mentions and energy. If you were also present at SXSW, we would like to know what your greatest takeaways were.

Samsung Turning Up the Heat Against Apple iWatch

With the arrival of a new wave of wearable tech gadgets, it comes as no surprise that tech giants such as Apple, Google and Samsung are riding at the forefront of this wave. Samsung too? Yes, you heard right. Since Apple released news on its Apple iWatch, many have wondered why its other competitors have suddenly gone all quiet. Yet, just this week, Samsung announced that they have been working on a smart watch too. Well then, I guess we will all just have to keep watch for now!

Nike & Its Quantified Self Accelerator Programme

Taking a step towards the realm of fitness within the Quantified Self community, we see that fitness giant Nike has also decided to invest additional resources into developing some top-notch wearable tech gadgets to enhance one’s physical fitness performance. With 10 companies in its TechStars Accelerator, each possessing very different value propositions, it is definitely worth keeping a lookout to see which of them emerges as Nike’s Next Big Thing.

Beauty in Time-Lapse Videos

Could we build a ship in 76 seconds? Or take a spin through seven states in Australia in just 346 seconds? Or virtually orbit around the Earth in 248 seconds? These, and others, have been made possible through time-lapse videos, tediously put together by some of the most artistic and talented (and not to mention, very patient) people so that the rest of us on this Earth can take a visual tour and be blown away! And we’re anticipating in excitement to see how the Memoto Camera can propagate this beauty (:

Watch more time-lapse videos: A year through my window (Australia) and Time-Lapse | Earth

Release of Memoto Sample Photos and Moment View

Last week, we released some sample photos taken with our Memoto Camera prototype. This week, we provided more updates with respect to the Moment View on the Memoto Lifelogging App. Stay tuned for more updates from us!

If you enjoyed this post, please follow us on twitter and facebook! PS – Have you pre-ordered your Memoto Lifelogging Camera yet?

This week in Lifelogging: Biohacking, wearable tech and an app that dreams big

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Interested in Biohacking?

dave asprey

Dave Asprey, who appears in the upcoming Lifeloggers documentary, was interviewed by Business Insider about his involvement in the quantified self movement. “Through biohacking, Asprey says he’s learned how to “turn on happy” and turn off stress with just one breath. He’s even increased his IQ by more than by 20 points, but won’t say exactly how much.”

QS and Technology

The article mentions several different variables that are being tracked with ease by the currently available technology: Mood, eating habits, fitness goals, sleep, brainwave activity, life’s moments. “In today’s world, each individual is a mini-corporation gathering data, measuring inputs and outputs, and looking for insights to better lead their life.” What are you tracking about yourself? What do you use to track them?

Future Tech

From wearable sensors to driverless cars, the coming technology looks interesting and is rapidly progressing. “You can bet there will be plenty of inventions in the realm of wearable computing, we’re just hitting the tip of the iceberg now.” What kind of tech have you been waiting to see?

Wearable technology and driving

An interesting thing about this disruptive technology, especially wearables since they are so personal, is the uncertainty and interest in how it will transform current norms. People are already wondering how they will effect everything from activities like driving to socially constructed concepts like privacy. It will be interesting to see what other issues and concerns emerge as more devices are released. One thing we’re sure of is that wearing a Memoto camera while driving will certainly be legal, and maybe even preferable in the eyes of your insurance company:)

An App to help you achieve your dreams

Everest is an app that will help you identify, plan and motivate your way to realizing your dreams. The creators of the app claim it “helps you tackle goals by combining inspiration, organization and social support.” Read more about the app and let us know your opinion. Do you think an app like this would help you reach your big goals? Are you already using something like it? Do you see the Memoto camera complementing an app like this?

Homer Simpson is a lifelogger

A photograph every day – Homer Simpson

Happy Friday!

The Perfect Package

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A lot of things happened this week. Some highlights: moving the Stockholm team to a larger office, a company-wide planning session in Linköping and comparing packaging prototypes!

You might be surprised the amount of time and effort that goes into just our packaging. Quality is important to us, so we’ve been working with Ehrenstråhle & Wågnert this past year to create the perfect package for your Memoto Camera.

Ehrenstråhle & Wågnert is a Stockholm design agency with a focus on brand identity and packaging design. They’ve worked with some great internationally known companies and institutions, such as Rebtel, Stockholm School of Economics and iZettle.

The packaging design process began in May 2012 and was just finalized. Inspiration for the design came from the physical appeal books have; the packaging is meant to be something you’ll want to display and enjoy for years to come.

David Ehrenstråhle, who designed the Memoto packaging, explains the design process from his point of view, “Our main goal with the Memoto packaging design is to enhance the customer’s impression of the product; It should not only make the camera look neat and pleasant. We wanted to make a package that appeals to the consumer in a way that she or he wants to keep it as a decoration by itself. We always strive to make beautiful and innovative package design and hope that the end product with its pure and minimalistic form language will be a feast for your eyes.”

Here’s a peek at what you’ll be receiving.

If you enjoyed this post, please follow us on twitter and facebook! PS – Have you pre-ordered your Memoto Lifelogging Camera yet?

The only way to get a Memoto Camera in the new color is…

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…to back us on Kickstarter!

Thanks to everyone who took time to vote! The results are in: There are 719 votes for 29 different colors and the winner, with 312 votes, is…BLACK! This is possible because of all you wonderful backers. We reached the very first stretch goal with your help and now we have you to thank for helping us choose the new camera color! You guys are awesome!

The piano black camera will be made exclusively for Kickstarter. All backers will have black as a color choice for their camera. But the color is only available through Memoto’s Kickstarter campaign and will not be a color choice on Memoto.com. The campaign ends tomorrow, November, 30th at 12:00pm (CET)!

The Memoto Camera in Piano Black (exclusively for Kickstarter)

The Memoto Camera Lineup

Tell your friends not to wait! If they want a camera in Black there’s only one day left to get it!

Go to our Kickstarter Campaign!

If you enjoyed this post, please follow us on twitter and facebook! PS – Have you pre-ordered your Memoto Lifelogging Camera yet?

Seamless Lifelogging with The Memoto App

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The development team is hard at work on the Memoto App. Reaching the 2^nd stretch goal allowed us to hire a project manager to facilitate the app development process and make sure we deliver the best possible product. Here’ s a look at how the app will work with your Memoto camera to bring you seamless lifelogging and how things are coming along.

The photos are analyzed based on various algorithms that consider not only explicit markers like GPS and time, but also lighting, clarity, photo composition, face detection and changes in context.

So, a moment may be 50 photos or 500, depending on these factors. For instance:

Your commute in your car (100 photos)
Meeting your co-worker on your way into the office (10 photos)
Getting coffee (6 photos)
Work at your desk (200 photos)
Attending a meeting (150 photos)
Lunch with a friend (100 photos)

These moments will then be presented to you on your smartphone as a Timeline; You can then go into a moment, view it as a time-lapse video and see other information about the moment, such as location and time.

Smartphone App Timeline and Moment View Screenshot (click for larger view)

The App in its current state

A look around the Stockholm Development Office

If you enjoyed this post, please follow us on twitter and facebook! PS – Have you pre-ordered your Memoto Lifelogging Camera yet?

Voting Time: Help choose the New Color!

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The reward for reaching the $150,000 stretch goal is to let the backer community nominate and vote on a new color. Today we will start polling on our Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/Memotocompany

The voting will run through next Wednesday, November 28th until 11:59pm CET.

Visit the Memoto Facebook page and vote today!

If you enjoyed this post, please follow us on twitter and facebook! PS – Have you pre-ordered your Memoto Lifelogging Camera yet?

This Week in Lifelogging: what visual lifelogging is like, Expereal and Lifeloggers

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“Somehow this is not the same as a regular camera”

Rob Shields – Search Your Life from Steven Jonas on Vimeo.

The concept of visual lifelogging is very interesting but the lack of widespread examples makes the actual practice of it a bit difficult to imagine. Rob Shields recently presented his QS project, Search Your Life, at the Portland QS Meetup. His presentation offers a lot of insightful information on what it’s like to self-track by passively taking photos of your daily life. Among other things, he talks about why he does this, how others react to it and what it’s useful for; three very relevant questions about this kind of lifelogging.

Free QS app helps keep track of how you experience life as it happens

The app allows you to rate your experience from 1-10 on a color wheel; other information regarding the experience can be added if desired. “Kahneman describes that as we recall past events – whether past relationships, jobs or vacations — we typically remember their totality in how they ended, NOT how we actually experienced them, regardless of their duration.” The makers of the app hope that by rating experiences as they happen, you will reduce this bias when reminiscing. What are your thoughts on QS in the psychological realm?

The Value of Self-tracking

What practical applications stem from self-tracking? Some people question why anyone’s daily life would be interesting enough to tediously log, and perhaps from a strictly entertainment based perspective this is true; most of us lead fairly uneventful lives. But there are many other facets to consider, such as self-improvement. Take, for instance, how much time we spend at work and how that effects our lives. Would realizing how much time you actually spend sitting or staring at a computer or mindlessly snacking help you make a change? Check out this infographic from Learn Stuff.com, click the photo view it in it’s entirety.

“Lifeloggers” trailer

Last summer, Memoto comissioned two student filmmakers to travel around the world and learn about lifelogging. The end result will be a free 30-minute documentary released in early 2013.

Six days left on Kickstarter!

It’s Black Friday! The Memoto Camera makes a great gift for any occasion and there are six days left to reserve one at $30 off the retail price! Visit our Kickstarter page at memoto.com/kickstarter!

Have a fantastic weekend!

Announcement: Memoto Camera now ready for trial manufacturing of both electronics and casing!

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Today we are able to make an announcement we have been looking forward to for a long time. We are now finished with the last tweaks of the electronics and mechanics and are ready to go into trial manufacturing of both! We are so proud that we have actually achieved this before the end of the Kickstarter campaign!

Electronics (camera & GPS)

There are a lot of challenges that go into making the electronics for a new camera, especially one so tiny. Luckily, we have, not one but two, very experienced and talented digital camera engineers on the job and they have been able to solve all of the challenges that go into the design of a new camera in less than a year!

The last step in turning our prototype into our tiny camera was to miniaturize the circuit board. The miniaturization had to undergo careful review from several different manufacturers and experts. Making the technology so small means, before going into trial manufacturing, we had to:

Make sure it fits into the camera casing without causing any problems during assembly or long term use
Verify our power management and battery life
Verify overall build quality and circuit wiring
Verify that the GPS will function properly and to compare it with a reference design
Verify our antenna placement in relation to other components and the casing

What we are so excited about now is that we have finalized the design of the miniaturized circuit board. As we outlined from the start of our Kickstarter project, this was the biggest engineering challenge of the entire project. It’s now going to the electronics manufacturer for a trial run. This means we are manufacturing about a dozen real, physical PCBs with surface mounted components and doing testing to see what works and not, before doing another trial. The purpose of the trials are to iron out any errors before doing a pilot run which is a little higher in volume and then the first production run of the cameras we are going to ship to you, our backers!

Mechanics (case & clip)
We worked with our manufacturer for the larger part of the year to get to the point where we are ready to start trial manufacturing of the finished case & clip construction as well. First we produced a design that the construction engineer then turned into a CAD drawing of a construction that is possible to produce and assemble. The next step now for the manufacturer is to start trial manufacturing there as well, by creating the trial tooling for plastic injection molding and then produce samples from it.

Finishing the construction has taken months of hard work. It should not only follow the design aesthetics, it must be possible to produce and assemble. It must also be weather protected and with great surface finish. The size must be as small as possible but still large enough to hold all the components going inside.

After trial samples have been produced we are going to approve the surface finish and overall quality before we do proper tooling with double shot injection molding of both back and front of the camera cover.

An awesome achievement by our team
With all this accomplished, both the electronics and mechanics are ready to go into trial manufacturing. We are so proud that we have actually achieved this before the end of the Kickstarter campaign! Our focus is on delivering all of you a high quality product within the time frame we have estimated. Now we are looking forward to having the first beta version of the camera in our hands in the beginning of January!

We are amazed by all your input and support!
Thanks to all the feedback we have gotten from our community, we have been able to focus on what really matters in terms of functionality and usage before finishing the design of the product. Equally important, thanks to your support we are now able to afford starting trial manufacturing right when the design is finished! We are such a small team compared to the giant corporations we are trying move ahead of. Without you backing us on Kickstarter we wouldn’t know if anyone was interested in Memoto, and could not afford to start manufacturing even if we knew!

The imaging sensor is the heart of any digital camera
The imaging sensor we are using is proven and already being used in millions of existing devices in the market. We haven’t invented any new technological components that are used in the Memoto camera; we’ve only taken tried and true, existing technology and made it our own. The sensor comes from Omnivision which is the world’s largest imaging sensor manufacturer. The sensor uses their backlit CMOS pixel technology, which provides great low-light performance.

Keep talking to us and telling your friends about Memoto! With the end of the Kickstarter campaign approaching fast, we need all the help we can get in getting the word out about Memoto!

If you enjoyed this post, please follow us on twitter and facebook! PS – Have you pre-ordered your Memoto Lifelogging Camera yet?

Lots of love,

The Memoto Team