Google Reveals ‘The Physical Web,’ A Project To Make Internet Of Things Interaction App-Less

Google’s Scott Jenson, an interaction and UX designer who left the company only to return to the Chrome team last November, has revealed a project underway at the company called The Physical Web to provide “interaction on demand” so that people can walk up and use any smart devices without the need for intervening mobile apps. This would make it possible for users to simply walk up to a bus stop and receive the time until the next arriving bus, without any additional software needed.

The project is an ambitious bet on the future of smart devices. Analysts are predicting explosions in connected devices over the next few years, with Cisco anticipating 50 billion Internet-connected gadgets in action by 2020, and Intel pegging the total at 15 billion by just next year. Google’s project, spearheaded by Jenson, would make it much easier for people to interact with the growing web of connected devices every day.

“People should be able to walk up to any smart device – a vending machine, a poster, a toy, a bus stop, a rental car – and not have to download an app first,” Jenson explains on the Physical Web project page. “Everything should be just a tap away.”

Th aim of the project isn’t just to create something that can be leveraged by Google devices and software, however; it wants to create a standard that can be used by everyone and that is open, like those used for the basic building blocks of the web. A shared standard would definitely help expand the usefulness of connected devices, but Apple has already taken steps towards its own proprietary version of this kind of tech with iBeacon and with its new contextually relevant app suggestions in iOS 8.

Jenson lists some practical applications of the proposed standards on the project page, including parking meters and vending machines that offer quick and app-less payments, universal physical retail shopping experiences and a ZipCar rental system that works via the signs advertising the parking spaces themselves. As for why Chrome is spearheading this effort, the team sees this as yet another web standard, operating as it does beyond siloed native apps.

An accepted open standard is probably still years away, if we ever get one, but the idea of an Internet of Things that doesn’t require even a single centralized software hub like those provided by SmartThings and others is tempting, especially since it democratizes control over the system.

Little Moe Is A Robot That Hunts And Kills Ebola

A San Antonio-based company called Xenex has risen to media prominence recently thanks to their ultraviolet pulse robot called Little Moe. The robot can enter and clean a hospital room in five minutes and destroy the virus by fusing its DNA. You can watch the cute local news piece about the below.

The technology isn’t particularly new. It works by flashing surfaces with ultraviolet light which in turn damages viral DNA. It uses a particularly bright type of xenon lamp that can “can penetrate and damage organisms in unique ways.”

Sadly the robot doesn’t move itself through the hospital like a virus-destroying Roomba. Instead, you place the robot in a room, set up the room type and number, and arm the robot. It then raises its pulsing and starts firing UV light into the room.

Medical robotics is a big business and it is changing daily. While telemedicine and the like get all the ink, robots like Little Moe are important because they do one thing and they do it very well, in this case room disinfection. And if a cute name and an Ebola scare are what it takes to move medical science forward, I’m all for it.

Skylanders Trap Team Review: Good Storytelling And Simple RPG Mechanics Succeed

The ‘Toys to Life’ category has been a much-needed savior for the gaming and toy industry alike, bolstering sluggish sales for both by anticipating a huge demand for real-life action figures that can be ‘brought to life’ for use in digital games. Activision’s Skylanders series pioneered the concept, and the originator is back with Trap Team, a new installment with the unique game mechanic of allowing players to ‘trap’ key villains in special physical play pieces, which makes them playable in-game as characters.

That’s not the only trick Skylanders Trap Team has up its sleeve, however – the game is being billed as the first to launch simultaneous, completely identical games on both tablets and dedicated gaming consoles. Trap Team is available as a starter pack either for the standard Wii, PlayStation and Xbox consoles you know and love, or for the iPad 3 and higher, along with select Android and Kindle Fire tablets. The tablet version works across devices from various manufacturers, and comes with a Portal and dedicated controller that both use Bluetooth LE to connect, and are battery-powered so you can use them anywhere.

Skylanders developer Toys for Bob assured me, during an interview with founder Paul Reiche, that there was no time at which they felt they needed to cut features or rein in their ambitions for the project in order to deliver a satisfying experience on both iPad and console, and one that offered the full experience in both places. I tested the game both on PlayStation 4 and iPad mini with Retina Display, and it definitely seems like the same thing on both, with a few caveats.

On iPad, you have to download new content like additional Skylander characters and some worlds and environments, while on the console everything is instantly available. This can be either mildly or very annoying, depending on your connection speed, but even with my fast home Wi-Fi some things took longer than others. The waiting is made less annoying by the fact that once you’ve downloaded something, it’s available and loads quickly the next time around.

What’s great about the iPad version is that Vicarious Visions, the team behind the mobile app for Trap Team (and sister studio to Toys for Bob) has delivered a near-perfect mobile gaming experience, in that it can work as either a completely contained title with just the tablet and software, or expand into something a little more robust with the accessory Portal and controller hardware. Vicarious Visions co-founder Karthik Bala explained in an interview that designing an experience that required nothing else, and that could be easily packed up, moved and used anywhere was a key part of their vision for Trap Team for tablets.

With an iPad mini with Retina display, I could use the entire Trap Team setup on my desk next to my workstation with little to no interference on my main screen, and aside from some aesthetic differences I noticed (fewer background assets, mostly), the tablet experience was the same as the one on the PS4. My saved games didn’t cross both, but character progress did (it sticks with the toys, of course) and you can still enjoy both versions at the same time.

As for the game itself, it’s my introduction to the Skylanders series, and I have to say I was impressed by both the storytelling, and the level of quality when it comes to character animations is fantastic. Skylanders actually beats some of its rivals with more experience in animated storytelling, like Disney, when it comes to the cutscenes and overall game progression, and the humor and likability of its characters.

The gameplay is repetitive and simple, but then again, this is a title aimed primarily at the 6-12 age bracket, and the puzzles it does provide are just complex enough to avoid coming off as insulting. The fun is in the grind, for more advanced players, and in levelling up your Skylanders to the cap of 20, along with unlocking their powers along the way. One knock against Trap Team is that it doesn’t up the level cap beyond what was introduced in last year’s Swap Force, and older Skylander toys don’t get improved abilities. The game also requires you to use the new Skylander Trap Master figures to unlock a good chunk of the game’s extra content, which means you’ll have to invest in new toys as a completionist, but then again these are mostly Hats and accessories and don’t take away from the core experience.

Playing as villains is a nice, but mostly shallow experience in Trap Team, with no progression available for the baddies. But the idea of redeeming them and their ongoing narration via the Portal’s speaker is charming, and each at least has a sidequest that can “evolve” the character. Activision has also shown some welcome restraint, here: you don’t need a separate trap for each villain, just one of each elemental type, and you can shuffle character off and on to those.

Skylanders Trap Team ends up being a game that’s fun to play, either alone or with a friend, that just so happens to also encourage a huge amount of accessory purchasing. I’m of the school of thought that if you’re going to be buying toys for your kids anyway, they might as well have some lasting value (Activision once again says these will be forward-compatible with new software in the series). And while I value the appeal to my nostalgia and existing habits that Disney’s Infinity series, and especially its new Marvel line bring, the work Activision is doing creating entirely original IP and weaving it into an actual narrative is impressive. If you’re a fan of the series, Trap Team won’t disappoint, and if you’re new to the game, this is as good a jumping off point as any.

Keep Calm And Attend Hardware Alley In London

It’s Hardware Alley time again and we want to see you at Disrupt London! The alley, which runs during the last day of Disrupt, features all of my favorite startups – the hardware ones – in glorious Technicolor.

What is Hardware Alley? It’s a celebration of hardware startups (and other cool gear makers) that features everything from robotic drones to 3D printers. We try to bring in an eclectic mix of amazing exhibitors and I think you’ll agree that our previous Alleys have been roaring successes.

We’d like you to register as a Hardware Alley exhibitor. You’ll get to exhibit on the last day of Disrupt London, October 21, to show off your goods and get access to some of the most interesting people (and most interesting VCs) in the world.

All you need to demo is a laptop. TechCrunch provides you with: 30″ round cocktail table, linens, table-top sign, inclusion in program agenda and website, exhibitor WiFi, and press list.

You can reserve your spot by purchasing a Hardware Alley Exhibitor Package here.

If you are Kickstarting your project now or bootstrapping, please contact me at john@techcrunch.com with the subject line “HARDWARE ALLEY.” I will do my best to accommodate you.

Hope to see you in London!

StoreDot Charges Up With $42M For Its Fast-Charging Bio-Organic Batteries

Israeli startup StoreDot, which is developing quantum dot-utilizing fast-charging smartphone battery technology, among other things, has closed a $42 million Series B funding round. It pitches its bio-organic nano-crystal technology as an enabler for faster charging batteries and also a cheaper and non-toxic alternative to cadmium in screens.

StoreDot demoed the speedy charging battery technology back in April, flaunting its potential with a prototype device that charged from flat to full in 30 seconds — although it used a less than full capacity battery that was too large to fit inside a phone.

Commercializing this technology will require applying it to a full capacity battery and squeezing everything to fit inside a standard smartphone — and that’s what it intends to use the new funding round for, it said today.

Speaking to TechCrunch, StoreDot’s CEO and founder Dr Doron Myersdorf said: “The fully functioning prototype that fits inside the phone for commercialization will be ready the second half of 2016. In early 2017 it will be on the market.”

Also on the slate for StoreDot post-Series B: new hires, and developing other technology products that make use of its nano crystal bio-organic technology. To that end, it said it sees potential for its technology to enhance various electronics areas — including superfast Flash memory and bio-lasers (i.e. in addition to batteries, displays and bio-LEDs).

Other use-cases for the tech it’s looking at are in an area it terms “nano-medicine” — citing “drug delivery, food security, bio labeling and more” as areas of interest here.

Medical uses are not surprising, given that StoreDot’s technology was actually spun out of research being done into Alzheimer’s disease at Tel Aviv University. That research identified particular peptides (amino acids) that the startup is utilizing for electronics.

“When the self-assembly process of these molecules can be managed, we can create nano-crystals,” said Myersdorf back in April, discussing how the technology works. “We were able to take the same peptides that participate in biological processes in our body and to create nano-crystals — these are stable, robust spheres.

“And these can be used… in a semi-conductor device or in a battery or in a display. We are talking about new type of materials that can be introduced into different types of devices.”

Investors in StoreDot’s new funding round are largely undisclosed, with multiple unnamed “strategic partners” cited in a press release. (Samsung has previously been rumored to be an investor in the technology but a StoreDot spokeswoman declined to comment on this.)

The round does include a confirmed $10 million investment from Russian businessman Roman Abramovich’s private asset management company, Millhouse LLC.

StoreDot had raised a total of $6.25 million before this Series B round, with prior investors including Singulariteam, a private investment fund focused on early stage startups.

Myersdorf previously told TechCrunch StoreDot was hoping to close a $20 million Series B so it has evidently been able to boost the size of the round considerably — given today’s announcement of a $42 million closing. The size of the round will enable the startup to commercialize “both the fast charging battery for smartphones and our BioLED display”, he added in a statement today.

Garmin Announces A New Running Watch, The Super Smart Forerunner 920XT

Running watches can either be dead simple – see Timex’s Ironman line – or complex. Garmin usually errs on the side of complex. Their latest running watch, the 920XT, will be available before the holiday and promises enough bells and training whistles to help you go from couch to (probably not) a 100 miler in a few weeks.

The new Forerunner looks similar to the previous models – large screen, big body, comfortable strap – but is waterproof and allows you to track bicycle rides and pool laps. It also connects to your cellphone allowing you to pick up reminders, text messages, and notifications right on your watch. It also includes WiFi so you can upload stats directly without a cable. The watch costs $449 without a heart rate monitor and $499 with.

Some features include:

The Forerunner 920XT’s sleek design is 15 percent lighter and 18 percent thinner than its predecessor, and features flexible, hinged watch bands for a more comfortable fit. Its high-resolution color display features a watch mode, and daily activity tracking features including steps, distance, calories, countdown to a personalized daily goal, audible move alert after one hour of inactivity, and sleep tracking. It also keeps users connected with smart notifications of incoming text, email, call, calendar reminders and more when in range of a paired Bluetooth device.

I’ve been running with Garmin for years – the Fenix 2 is my current favorite – and it’s been fascinating to see the evolution of these pieces from the hotel-soap-sized 305 to is bright and beastly watch. We’ll have a hands-on test over the next few weeks but until then you can check it out here.

This Week On The TC Gadgets Podcast: Gapgate, Garmin, And Jamstik

We’re off and running this week with the latest TC Gadgets podcast. Garmin announced a new smart watch called the Forerunner 920XT. We take a look at that, as well as Garmin’s earlier smart watch offering, the VivoFit. We’re also curious about what’s going on with #gapgate, on the Galaxy Note 4 smartphones.

Meanwhile, the Jamstik MIDI device is finally shipping.

We discuss all this and more on this week’s episode of the TC Gadgets Podcast featuring John Biggs, Matt Burns, and Darrell Etherington.

Have a good Friday, everybody!

We invite you to enjoy our weekly podcasts every Friday at 3 p.m. Eastern and noon Pacific. And feel free to check out the TechCrunch Gadgets Flipboard magazine right here.

Click here to download an MP3 of this show.
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Intro Music by Mendhoan.

Bowflex Max Trainer M5 Review: Connected, Intense Exercise In A Relatively Compact Package

A blogger’s life is not the most active lifestyle possible for a human; tech bloggers probably get the most exercise walking to and from the post office to retrieve packages they missed at home or to ship things back out. If you don’t have a standing desk, you probably barely even rise out of your seat at a job where the Internet is your main medium, source and subject. The chance to review the Bowflex MAX Trainer M5 was, therefore, both tantalizing and terrifying in equal measure.

Bowflex has gone high-tech with its home gym line, and the Max Trainer M5 boasts smartphone and heart rate monitor connectivity that use Bluetooth LE to communicate with your device, so that you can ditch the pencil and paper to keep track of your progress (or lack thereof). The M5 is the top-of-the-line MAX trainer, too so it also packs a fancy display, heart rate target zone monitoring, and its own contact heart-rate monitor in the box, in addition to the company’s unique exercise action, which is low-impact like ellipticals for an easier overall time for your joints, while also providing more efficiency for a higher caloric burn rate over the same period of time in use.

The Max M5 has a high-end pricetag to match its feature list – it’s available for $1,599 right now direct from the manufacturer. But it has a lot of advantages vs., for example, a gym membership, especially for the soft-bodied bloggers out there like myself. The first is that it’s remarkably small in terms of its overall footprint, which is is surprising if you check it out online and even when you see the pictures of it installe din a space. My review unit was delivered by two friendly guys who doubted it could make it through my very narrow entrance hallway (which is split between my place and my upstairs neighbor), but it managed to navigate the corridor without much effort.

It also takes up just a small corner of my office, leaving plenty of room for two desks and a modest home entertainment unit. It’s smaller than a treadmill, and most of the space it does take up is vertical. Plus, it doesn’t suffer from the kind of footfall impact that can make using treadmills in apartments or second-floor dwellings a major no-no.

Which is all well and good, but how well does it actually work? As with any exercise product, it’s hard to tell the hype from the reality with Bowflex, and years of infomercials of toned 50-somethings doesn’t help. But practically speaking, having switched from a daily 5K running routine to a daily Bowflex MAX Trainer workout, I’ve noticed no significant change in weight (maintenance was my goal) and if anything, more toned musculature, especially through the core. The action is reminiscent of an elliptical machine, but feels also somewhat like a stair-climber, and wore me out surprisingly quickly, with ample variation between low- and high-intensity settings.

The M5 gets your upper body involved in the workout, as you can generate a lot of force with your arms, chest and core through the handles in addition to the steps. I could definitely feel the effects, but I was really surprised by how much my legs felt weak after each workout, which was a good thing. My body is likely accustomed to running, but generally all I feel now after my daily outing around the local outdoor track is joint pain, whereas the M5 resulted in the kind of post-workout burn and general weakness that indicates actual progress.

Bowflex’s app for tracking your history and viewing your workout progress isn’t the best thing in the world, and it’s clear they were focused on providing an interface that resembled the on-device workout gauge more than anything else. But it works, and it captures your workout results via seamless syncing in my experience after a painless initial setup process. It’s nice that it can sync workout data back to MyFitnessPal, but I’d like to see the company go further and build a way to output this data to Health and other apps via HealthKit, but I’m not holding my breath, as the connected aspect of this hardware seems like a nice-to-have add-on, rather than a core feature.

Overall, though, Bowflex has built a workout machine that’s well-built and designed with potentially tight spaces in mind. It’s a workout that won’t necessarily replace a whole home gym, but will provide you with some much-needed cardio in the cold winter months, or if you prefer preserving your knees, hips and ankles from frequent runs. $1,600 is a lot to pay for a piece of equipment, but it almost pays for itself after a year of use compared to a gym membership in a metro area, if you’re just after a demanding physical activity that gets you out of the office chair or off the sofa for a few minutes each day. Given the usual vigors of the blogger lifestyle, that’s a service that could prove life-saving over the long-term.

Mophie’s Samsung Galaxy S5 Juice Pack Gives You Ample Smartphone Life

Mophie has a new Juice Pack out, designed for the Galaxy S5. The case packs a huge 3,000 mAh battery within its glossy shell, which is slightly larger than the 2,850 mAh unit within the Galaxy S5 itself. True, you could carry around a spare battery for the GS5 and pop the back whenever you want more power, but the Mophie’s extra juice is just a switch away, and it includes passthrough charging, which is a lot simpler than changing out internal components.

The Mophie comes in a variety of colors, but the review unit I was sent is a glossy white. It’s like the Mophie battery packs you’ve come to know and love, with a curved back ensconcing the ‘baby bump’ of the spare powerhouse. Of note, however, is that this will significantly increase the pocket presence of your GS5, since at its thickest point it more than doubles the depth of the device.

It also adds length to the top and bottom of the 4.7-inch smartphone, giving it a physical footprint more akin to that of the new iPhone 6 Plus, but with a much chunkier profile. As you might expect, it also adds weight. But the trade-offs have immediately apparent value: You’ll likely get a full charge from empty from the battery pack, plus or minus a little bit depending. Given Samsung’s already impressive battery life on the GS5, you’ll find that can mean up to three or more full days of battery on a single charge of both the case and phone, which is game-changing when you’re using it on excursions.

I’m reluctant to carry around the behemoth that the GS5 plus the Mophie becomes when combined Voltron-style too often, but for special cases like conferences it would be a veritable life-saver. Mophie’s typical commitment to quality shows here, too, with a battery that should last you more cycles than lower cost options from Amazon.

Mophie’s accessory will run you $99.95, so it’s worth considering whether you need this kind of gear in your life before laying down some cash, but if you find yourself seeing that red battery icon more often than you’d like, it’s still likely your best, most convenient choice for spare top-ups.

Apple’s OS X Yosemite Reaches GM Status, Nears Consumer Launch

Apple’s OS X Yosemite operating system is arriving soon, and the fact that the developer preview just reached Golden Master status, alongside a 4th public beta preview update, means we probably don’t have long to wait. Last year, Apple released its Mavericks GM build about three weeks before it released the update to the Mac App Store for everyone to download, so Yosemite is on track for the mid-to-late October launch window many are predicting.

Apple is expected to launch Yosemite at a special event, at which it will also reveal new iPads, according to multiple rumors. The event will probably take place either in the first two weeks of October, or during the last week of the month, following a report from the always-accurate Jim Dalrymple that it won’t happen on October 21 as originally reported by at least one source. Given the timing of this GM release, either an October 14 or an October 28 date make the most sense.

The GM build is generally the same (or very close) to the final release that Apple makes available to consumers. Last year, a revised version of the GM was introduced just two days prior to the final launch of Mavericks, which took place on October 22, at a special event during which Apple introduced the iPad Air, as well as the iPad mini with Retina Display. Sequels to those two devices are likely on the agenda for any October product refresh Apple has planned this year.

New Macs are also likely in store, though exactly what will be revealed remains up in the air. Some reports suggest that there will be a Retina iMac line for the first time since the debut of Apple’s Retina display technology for Mac hardware with 2012’s MacBook Pro. There has also been a lot of buzz around a 12-inch Retina MacBook Air, though reports are mixed on whether this would arrive this year or next.

Another question mark is a 12.9-inch iPad that Apple is said to be developing, according to Bloomberg, with a reported launch date early next year. Given that Apple also plans to launch the Apple Watch in “early 2015,” it’s possible we’ll see a separate follow-up event that includes some of the products mentioned above alongside its official availability announcement.

Either way, this Yosemite preview software launch is likely the last before full consumer availability, so get your computers, hearts and minds ready.

Kahuna Plans To Avoid “Wrist Fatigue” With New Algorithm For Smartwatch App Notifications

It sounds like the upcoming Apple Watch and other wearable gadgets are going to create a whole new avenue for apps to communicate with you — and that could get pretty annoying.

At least, that’s the assumption at Kahuna, a Sequoia Capital-backed startup that helps mobile marketers test and automate their push notifications.

I mean, excessive notifications can get annoying on your phone, too. But founder and CEO Adam Marchick suggested that with wearables devices, there’s a risk that (for example) you could go to the movies, turn off your phone like a conscientious moviegoer — but your smartwatch continues chiming “every five seconds” because you keep getting notifications.

You don’t want to be that person. As the person sitting behind you at the theater, I don’t want you to be that person. And if you’re an app publisher or developer, you don’t want to be the one annoying your users in similar situations.

That’s why, in Marchick’s words, Kahuna has extended its existing technology and “built some new algorithms on top of it to determine what type of messages are really watch-worthy.” There are few big pieces to Kahuna’s wearable algorithms, he added — first, a layer that automatically limits messages to prevent “over-messaging.” There’s also an element that looks at the urgency and timeliness of a message (“Does this have to be completed in the next 10 or 15 minutes?”).

Kahuna can also look at the behavior of individual users and help developers target their messages accordingly. So if you always order delivery between 5:30 and 6 on Tuesday evenings, and if it’s 6:05 on Tuesday and you haven’t made the order, then there’s a good chance you just forgot. That could be the right time to send a reminder, Marchick said.

The company says the algorithm will be compatible with the Apple Watch and eventually Android devices as well. While Marchick pitched this approach as relevant to the entire wearable ecosystem, he also suggested that the Apple Watch will be “the first wearable that gets to scale.”