Category: Tech news

This winter is looking to be a mild one (it’s something like 60 degrees here in New Jersey), but no worries: YouTube is bringing the snow to you, even if Mother Nature won’t.

It looks like most of YouTube’s videos are now outfitted with a special snow button, which as you may expect, turns the video into a winter wonderland.

Alright, so maybe that’s a stretch. It’s not so much a blizzard as it is a handful of snowflakes that trickle down from the top of the video and pile up at the bottom. There’s no word yet on how long the snow effect will stay live, but here’s hoping it sticks around for a while — it’s bound to be the only snow I get to see all winter.

I’m already looking forward to playing with the snow button on some really inappropriate videos — how about making Tatooine look more like Hoth? Or how about this CrunchGear classic, which thanks to YouTube’s new flair, combines some hot pancakes with some cold weather?

Skitch, the popular photo editing Mac app acquired by Evernote in August, is now available on the iPad. The release follows the launch of the Skitch for Android app earlier this year, and is the first iOS-compatible version available. Using the new app, you can annotate just about anything – a new photo, one from your camera roll, a screenshot, a map or you can just draw on a blank canvas.

And, of course, when you’re finished with your creation, you can save the photo to Evernote for safekeeping.

After choosing your starting point (a photo, screenshot, etc.), you can edit your creation using a number of built-in tools that take advantage of the iPad’s touchscreen interface. Objects you draw on the screen can be moved around with your finger or pulled into the trash. A pencil tool lets you draw freehand. You can add text. And you can drag, pull and adjust other objects like arrows, circles, squares and lines.

None of this is entirely ground-breaking stuff, but Skitch does what it does very well. It’s a pleasure to use.

In addition to the Evernote integration, your creations can also be tweeted or even – and this is pretty cool, too – mirrored to any Apple TV connected screen via AirPlay. It’s DIY Powerpoint with free tools. Nice.

But I know what you’re thinking: WHERE IS SKITCH FOR IPHONE ALREADY?

Evernote says its “in the works,” which is what they’ve been saying since August. According to the company blog post, they launched on iPad first because it’s “the ideal form factor for tactile annotation.” What about the nearly four-month-old Android app then?

You can grab the new iOS version of Skitch from here.

Power strips need a reboot. Look under your desk: wall warts the size of doorstops, massive AC power bricks, phone chargers with too-clever sideways designs that cover adjacent sockets. Buy a standard six-plug strip and you’re lucky to be able to use four of them.

Necessity being the mother of invention, manufacturers have been turning out power strips with adjustable and flexible designs that offer more accommodating approaches at a range of prices.

Of course, in addition to making it easier to connect a number of chargers and gadgets to one outlet, these devices also protect your electronics against power spikes and surges. The current in your wall outlet doesn’t always stay pegged at 120 volts — it can surge, sending too much electricity through the wires and damaging your precious MacBook Air. If a spike is of considerable enough length (and such things last only a few nanoseconds), it can totally zap a piece of unprotected hardware and start a fire. All three power strips I tested have some level of surge protection, each offering a different amount.

First up is Pivot Power’s six-socket strip, which sprung from Quirky.com’s community-based invention site. Each of the six well-spaced sockets on the blue and white strip is separated by a hinge, allowing you to arrange it in multiple configurations to fit all your brick plugs — as Gadget Lab’s Charlie Sorrel eloquently put it, “the caterpillar-like Pivot-Power lets you twist to fit and therefore fill every electrical orifice.”

With its six feet of cord, the Pivot Power handles up to 1,875 watts of juice and offers a comparative soupçon of surge protection of up to 672 joules. (A joule is a measurement equal to one “watt second” — the amount of energy required to produce one watt for one second). Not exactly heavy duty, but a good start. And for the low $30 price, getting even that much surge protection makes the Pivot Power an attractive buy considering the convenience of the design.

Next was a $40 unit, Kensington’s SmartSockets Table Top. It offers six well-spaced sockets in a tight, circular design. The small footprint belies its capability to accommodate six power bricks. And true to its name, the thing can conveniently sit on a desk or underneath one. Its 16-foot power cord is generous — you can position it just about anywhere in a room. Each socket is color-coded, and the package includes matching cord labels, another handy bit of housekeeping since you’re never left wondering which plug goes with which device.

The SmartSocket also bests the Power Pivot’s 672 joules with a higher surge protection rating of 1,500 joules. In fact, Kensington is so sure of its surge protection, it offers a $50,000 connected equipment replacement warranty. More comforting, the company says it’s never had to pay out.

But if you require even more robust protection, the PowerSquid Surge3000 Calamari promises to never fry your equipment. It sports six flexible octopus-like “legs,” cords of varying lengths to fit even the most massive transformer block plugs. Partnered with this is a fantastic 3,240 joules of surge protection backed with a $500,000 limited warranty against equipment damage.

The design is nice, with two blue, neon, find-me-in-the-dark glowing sockets, and an eight-foot cord with a swiveling flat profile plug to make it easier to fit in any hard-to-reach power outlet.

The base of the unit includes an audible alarm that’s triggered when surges occur. It also has a pair of phone jacks for your land-line phone, and a pair of coaxial connections for protecting your TV from surges over cable lines. The only downsides of the PowerSquid are its clumsy size and rather industrial aesthetics. But considering what it accomplishes, these are minor peeves. Also, the price tag is officially $70, but you can find one as low as $50 online.

Quirky Pivot Power, $30

Kensington SmartSockets Table Top, $40

PowerSquid Surge3000 Calamari, $70

Sweating through a workout has its rewards, but one undeniable hindrance is when headphones continually pop out of your ears.

The issue arises when sweat builds up, lubricating the ear tips. All that movement, all that flexing, and the buds fall from the ear canals all too easily. Rather than listening to your favorite adrenaline-soaked AC/DC track to help you finish that set of biceps curls, you have to hear the guy next to you disgustingly grunt out his bench press reps as your headphones dangle at your side.

It’s a problem many manufacturers are trying to solve by making sports-specific earbuds –listening devices designed not only to withstand the sweat of your workout, but also to keep the damn things in your ears.

Along these lines, Polk Audio has introduced an entire family of earphones for athletes. Polk’s new UltraFit line is led by the $100 UltraFit 3000 in-ear-canal model I tried. Sonically, they’re a huge step up from the $10 buds you get at your local electronics superstore, but they’re also engineered to stay wrapped around your ears no matter how many ounces of sweat you work up.

The wrap-around design is critical to the fit. A couple seconds of cajoling nestles the plastic pieces behind your ears, where they remain secure. They never fell off my ears during the month I wore them to my gym, including consistent running sessions and one rousing hour of full-court layup drills (These are the things I do to try to bring you a well-rounded review).

Music sounds great. The bass throbs and pulsates, and nothing sounds strained, even at the higher volume levels. Polk Audio ships the 3000s with seven pairs of differently-sized tips, which is more options than most in-ears. Finding the correct tip, and thus attaining the proper seal to get the best sound performance, is easy with all those options.

My favorite design detail: color-coded left and right cables. While each side still has the ‘L’ and ‘R’ near the ear bud to delineate which ear it should go in, the differently-colored cables are smart. You know which ear’s which at a glance.

Users have a choice between two cables: a 14-incher and a 41-incher that has its own microphone/remote assembly. This is where being an Apple connoisseur pays off. For everyone else, myself included, not so much. The remote controls and mic are compatible only with the following models: iPod nano (4th generation or later), iPod classic (120/160GB), iPod touch (2nd generation or later), iPhone 3GS, iPhone 4 and iPad 1 and 2. The remote is supported by the iPod shuffle (3rd generation and later) while the audio is supported by all iPod models. The pause/play button also worked with my HTC Incredible phone.

I had one big complaint. I prefer to attach my iPod’s carrying case and belt clip onto the waistband of my shorts. The two cable choices are both awkward — the 14-incher is too short and a 41-incher is too long. The long one gets caught too easily, like around my knee when I bend down to put a dumbbell on the floor. I could alleviate this by using the shorter cable and attaching my iPod to my shirt with the shirt clip that comes with the 3000s, but that’s not comfortable for me. A modest quibble, considering the performance.

WIRED Fantastic sound. Design prevents buds from popping out. Color-coded cables let you tell left from right at a glance. Various ear bud sizes ensures comfortable fit. Carrying case is anti-microbial.

TIRED Microphone/remote works only with Apple products. Length of 14-inch and 41-inch cables are problematic, limiting where you can attach your iPod.

The jury is still out on Windows 7 tablets — and, at this point, it looks like it may never come in — but with the Series 7 Slate, Samsung at least gives this difficult niche the old college try.

Our last encounter with a Windows tablet dates back to March’s Viewsonic ViewPad 10, which disastrously attempted to combine Windows and Android in one device, dramatically failing at both. Here, Samsung is at least wise enough to pick one, and give that OS its all.

On paper, it gets off to a good enough start: The 11.6-inch LCD is gloriously bright (if you can keep the blasted auto-dimmer from engaging) and offers a 1366×768-pixel resolution. Under the hood, the 1.6GHz Core i5, 4GB of RAM, and 128GB SSD hard disk would be capable specs for just about any standard laptop. And yet, at 1.9 pounds, the Samsung manages to weigh in at not much heavier than most 10-inch Android tablets.

Sure enough, performance is on par with similarly equipped laptops. If you connect a mouse and keyboard, you can even use the device for (very) rudimentary gaming — a testament not so much to the Series 7’s capabilities but rather its stability under load. It didn’t crash during a single benchmark test.

But the Series 7 is a tablet, not a laptop (Samsung confusingly makes both a Series 7 laptop and also this device with the almost-same name). As such, it’s designed with a different use pattern in mind. Like traditional tablets, the Series 7’s display auto-rotates based on how you’re holding it, but the vagaries of Windows means this happens more slowly than you might be used to with iOS or Android tablets. You’ll probably also want to use the included stylus instead of your finger. Clicking through Windows menus and toolbars is just too fine-grained for the average user’s ham-fisted touch. It’s up to you, though, to figure out what to do with the little plastic stick: There’s no place to store the stylus anywhere on the tablet, so consider wearing shirts with pockets from now on.

Samsung also includes a novel feature called the Touch Launcher, accessed via a button front and center at the base of the device. Press this and up pops a familiar icon wall very similar to the typical tablet interface. It’s pre-populated with links to YouTube, Twitter, a web browser, and so on. It all looks so easy, but these aren’t mobile apps — they’re either web shortcuts or Windows apps, many of which Samsung seems to have written itself. As such, they’re inextricably tied to Windows 7’s backend, and the spit-and-twine approach to building this system shows through often. Windows dialogue boxes often require your attention, and the overall lack of polish is distinct. Set the weather app to use Fahrenheit instead of Celsius, for example, and the weather widget on the Tablet Launcher home screen doesn’t make the change, only the app itself. The user can add and delete apps to this subsystem, but they have to be already installed on the device, or created as web links.

Aside from the Touch Launcher button, all the remaining buttons and ports are relegated to the sides. They are unfortunately difficult to get at by touch alone: All shaped like slim rectangles, it’s tough to tell the power button apart from the rotation lock button on the right, and the volume control on the left is actually tough to distinguish from the lone USB port (above) and mini-HDMI port (below) without a good amount of fumbling. A microSD slot and headphone/mic jack are also available. A charging dock accessory ($100) replicates the HDMI, USB and headphone ports, adds an Ethernet port, and props up the tablet for use with a wireless keyboard (Samsung’s is $80).

But the real issues with the Series 7 aren’t Samsung’s, they’re Microsoft’s. To date, most Windows tablets are targeted for “vertical markets” like healthcare and manufacturing management, where users are constantly on their feet and need full-on Windows at the ready. But the Series 7 lacks the ruggedness most of these devices boast. More casual users will likely wonder why none of this works “as well as my iPad,” and that’s a fair criticism.

The response to that issue is essentially why Windows 8 is being developed, at which point the Series 7 may be batting clean-up in a whole new ballgame.

WIRED PC-class features in a tablet body. Possibly the most powerful tablet on the market today.

TIRED Windows remains a struggle with a pen-and-finger interface. Samsung’s Tablet-esque add-on is only three-quarters baked. Dock and wireless keyboard cost extra. Tepid battery life of about 4.5 hours.

Photos by Michael Calore/Wired

Put your iPhone 4’s LED flash to use for reading menus in dimly lit restaurants or just making sure you don’t trip over the cat on the way to the bathroom at 4 am. The main screen features a large Maglite-esque on/off button for a continuous beam. It can also produce a strobe effect and even a flashing Morse code SOS.

Flashlight+

WIRED Compose in-app emails and texts without having to turn off the light. Lock the screen to prevent inadvertent touches.

TIRED Flash turns off when you switch apps.

Impress your friends with some smartphone magic. Harnessing the power of your proximity sensor, you can wave a hand over your phone to do things like launch an application, expand the notification bar, turn off the display, or make the device play a sound. Short on usefulness, long on fun.

Prox Pro

WIRED Can assign actions based on which way your phone is tilted. Confirms commands with a vibration.

TIRED Some proximity sensors work better than others (if you have one at all). Limited set of actions.

This excellent client for Simplenote, a popular cloud-based service, lets you manage and organize your notes from any Android smartphone. The key here is efficiency: Fire up the app and you can jump into a note or create a new one instantaneously. It also supports more advanced features like tags, clickable to-do lists, and sharing with your contacts.

Flick Note

WIRED Pinch gesture takes you full-screen. Customize fonts and colors.

TIRED You can’t search for text within a note.

A touchscreen keyboard learns the words you use most and how you (mis)type them, and then predicts what you meant to write with frightening accuracy. Let the utility analyze your Facebook, Twitter, Gmail, and texts to take stock of your vocabulary. The keyboard’s large keys register with a quick, satisfying vibration.

SwiftKey X

WIRED Predicts your next word before you type. Deletes previous word with a swipe.

TIRED Prediction bar eats up screen.

The simplest, most polished way to control your computer from your iPhone or iPad, whether you’re in the next room or the next country. Multitouch gesture support and big, touchable buttons make your machine’s files, accounts, and settings surprisingly accessible on smaller screens.

Screens

WIRED Far less of a headache to set up than other apps of its ilk. Works with Mac, Windows, and Linux PCs.

TIRED Pricey. Susceptible to lags and crashes at times.

Slap a faster and vastly more flexible home screen on your Android. Swiping through home screens and flicking through your app drawer is fast and silky smooth. Add a highly configurable dock and a gorgeous set of widgets for messaging, calendar, and Facebook, and you’ll wonder how you lived without it.

LauncherPro Plus

WIRED Lets you zoom out to survey thumbnails of all your home screens. Offers landscape view. Resizes nearly any widget.

TIRED Buggy in Android Gingerbread.

Whether you rely on Wikipedia as an arbiter of drunken trivia disputes or simply for fact foraging, this dedicated portal will get you info quicker than the mobile site. Search results are updated as you type, and a queue mode bookmarks entries that pique your interest (a single touch caches them for offline reading).

Wikipanion

WIRED Add other wikis, like the Star Wars Wookieepedia. Table of contents for jumping to desired sections. Quick adjustments for font size.

TIRED Can’t edit articles.

Cornell University has won the bid to build the big new technology campus on Roosevelt Island that New York City has been looking to create. The plan is to foster a strong technology ecosystem by bringing in lots of talented technical people and have them focus on building innovative businesses on top of the traditional industries in the city.

So I got on the phone with Daniel Huttenlocher after the press conference in New York earlier today, to get some more details about what his university is aiming to accomplish.

As the dean of the Faculty of Computing and Information Science (CIS), and a distinguished computer science professor at the University, he’s been in the middle of the effort to get the new campus. In the extensive interview below, he provides more details on the types of students that the school will be looking for, and how he sees it adding to the development of a strong technology ecosystem in the city. As he explains, no one fully understands what makes an ecosystem form, but good technical schools are clearly a component — that New York could use more of.

Huttenlocher has the right background for the job ahead. His research spans computer vision, autonomous vehicles, social networking communication, and software development management. He has 22 patents and more than 50 published papers. He’s also been involved with a few tech companies throughout his career. You can find out more about him here.

Officially called the NYCTech Campus, the facilities will be a joint effort with Technion-Israel Institute of Technology. The plan is to begin moving in by 2017, and finish constructing 1.3 million of the 2 million square foot facility by 2027. In 20 years or so, the campus is expected to have 2,500 students and 280 professors.

The expectations are high, and reflect the city’s efforts to iterate beyond its traditional industries like finance and advertising. A new study by New York City projects that the campus will generate above $23 billion in economic activity, along with $1.4 billion in tax revenue over the coming 30 years. In terms of job creation, construction will account for 20,000 near-term jobs, and the campus will provide 8,000 permanent ones. The study also estimates that some 600 companies will be spun out, that create another 30,000 jobs. To boost all of this, the campus will also introduce a $150 million fund for New York City startups. (Official announcement here, and more campus images here.)

TechCrunch: Now that the deal is finalized, can you tell me more about the steps Cornell is taking to help New York’s tech ecosystem?

Daniel Huttenlocher: Any successful tech ecosystem in any city has its own characteristics. There’s already a fairly vibrant one in New York but it’s “adolescent” in the sense that it’s not at the scale of Silicon Valley or even Seattle or Boston. But there’s definitely a lot here.

Our approach is to take what we think is unique and look at what kind of role we can play. In terms of the unique parts of the ecosystem, the tech world is undergoing major shifts. Historically, the new technologies that have driven things have been pure tech plays. Increasingly, the value of tech is not coming as much from the pure tech side, and much more from people who deeply understand who to take it and transform something.

Amazon is my favorite example. It’s a tech company and a retailer, and you can’t separate the two.

In New York City, that’s really the huge advantage — the presence of all these other industries.

TechCrunch: Can you tell me more specifically how Cornell’s academic programs are going to be playing a part in all this?

Daniel Huttenlocher: Academically, we’re looking at shifting away from traditional university campus disciplines. There’ll be key disciplines involved — computer science, electrical engineering, operations research, applied math — but those disciplines need to be in the context of other disciplines where tech is being applied…. hubs that combine tech and other fields. In media, for instance, there are relevant areas of the social sciences, like sociology and psychology.

It’s about building interdisciplinary groupings that focus on these domains — Connective Media, Healthier Life, and the Built Environment. That second one isn’t just health care, but things like lifestyle types of apps. The third is about smart building technology, green buildings.

If you look at startup companies in New York, there’s certainly media. That’s a big, active area in the city’s economy.

For health, you’re seeing some startups there. But I’d say it’s the leading edge of the startup world. Then with green tech, that’s the bleeding edge, and there are relatively few companies. There’s a lot of growth potential in all these areas from a jobs perspective, and we see the academic areas that support them are not pure tech.

The degrees offered — masters and PhDs — will require students to apply to the New York campus, based mainly on their interests in terms of faculty and programs. They’ll have significant entrepreneurship and business requirements. Students need to be interested in that. For those who want pure tech, there’s Ithaca [Cornell’s home campus].

The faculty is also going to be a mix of those only in the city and some who are spending time on each campus. I’m personally spending a lot of time in the city and may end up there.

One of the defining features is that students will have mentors. There are 50,000 alumni in the New York, with a significant portion in businesses where tech is playing an increasingly important role. Each students will have a local mentor working in business just like a student on a campus has a faculty advisers. We want students to come up with new ways of thinking based on things they’ve learned very recently, that have commercial potential.

TechCrunch: What have you learned from already having the medical college in New York?

Daniel Huttenlocher: It really helped give us confidence in the practicality of all of this. The number of faculty who own joint appointments in both places, that have labs in both places — we realized we could do the same for technical fields.

We’re also operating other large academic institutions in New York City, and we’re experienced with other aspects — constructing buildings, fundraising, etc.

When talking to the mayor [Michael Bloomberg], one of the big components is that we’d have an academic vision tailored to the city. Our alumni are also unbelievably supportive of it. [Deputy Mayor for Economic Development Robert K. Steel] has joked that out of our 50,000 local alumni, most have called him already to encourage the deal.

TechCrunch: Do you know why Stanford pulled out?

Daniel Huttenlocher: While this all turned in to a competition — at least to some people — every school that’s participated is great. It’s about finding the right match, not about which is better. I have a lot of really good friends at Stanford. And they may also end up here some day.

TechCrunch: How are you going to define success in terms of the New York innovation ecosystem? It’s not always obvious how academic work translates to new companies. And looking at Silicon Valley, it wasn’t just Stanford that made the place what it is — there were people experimenting with radio in the 20s, and the semiconductor industry in the 50s.

Daniel Huttenlocher: I know quite a bit about that. I worked at Xerox PARC in the late 80s and early 90s. What’s interesting about tech in Silicon Valley is that a lot of innovation comes outside of some corporate entities. Xerox, Fairchild Semiconductor and Paypal have all been incredible cauldrons of innovation, with literally dozens of companies spinning out of each.

What causes those things to happen? I don’t think anybody understands yet. Some of it comes from having the right universities around. Some of it comes from companies. The whole ecosystem creation process is, frankly, very poorly understood. What we think is clearly absent in New York City right now is enough of the right kind of engineering talent.

Everyone has a hard time hiring good software engineers — in the valley and everywhere else. New York has that problem much more than elsewhere in the country, it really needs that kind of tech talent. That’s what we view we’ll bring to the table very quickly.

Develpoing a vibrant ecosystem comes from having multiple companies at multiple stages of development, and will come from places you don’t expect.

[At this point in the phone interview, Huttenlocher is interrupted by his partners at Technion leaving the room, and I overhear them say an appropriate departing line: “now we start the real work.”]

TechCrunch: So tell me about classes starting next September. That seems like an aggressive schedule.

Daniel Huttenlocher:The plan is to start operating more or less immiediately. We’re starting to look for new [temporary] space, with some leased already, and some possibilities for others. Cornell has a lot of operations in the city already, including the medical college and architecture school. It’ll probably involve leasing additional space. We need to start attracting the good engineering talent, and we need a neutral meeting ground for all of the companies.

That’s an important role that Stanford plays in the Valley. It helps people come together outside of the domain of one corporate entity or venture firm. We want to play that role quickly. We’ll start having students down here as soon as we find space, and certainly by the fall.

Some of that will depend on admissions and other things that take time. Some students will already be at Cornell, who it’d make sense to bring down and start working with companies.

Although, a lot of the young startups in the city already have Cornell engaged with them. I’ve personally had meetings with more than 200 people in the local tech industry in the last few months. So it’s a matter of how do we really start to engage with the companies, and get them hooked up?

TechCrunch: Any parting thoughts?

Daniel Huttenlocher: Yeah. We’ve gotten ourselves as a world into a place where we’re not creating enough good jobs. This isn’t really just about New York. It’s really about global innovation. Every city has its own flavor, that people identify with, and that helps to create great new companies. I mean, this won’t stop me from spending quality time in Silicon Valley…. If we can get a bunch of tech-oriented cities, that’s good for everyone.

The world of patent litigation seems less and less connected to the real world as the rate of change and development outpaces the rate at which companies can patent new technologies, or even, as BT shows, sort through their existing ones. The amount of infringement lawsuits in play right now is mind-boggling, and while some have some common-sense merit, others simply don’t have a veneer of legitimacy. BT’s new lawsuit against Google, alas, seems to fall into the latter category.

The games these company play as far as picking and choosing who, how, and where they sue are beyond understanding by onlookers. It seems likely that the normal method of extortion via patent has failed, so BT has gone all-out, and is asking for damages, likely quite a sum, as they allege years of willful infringement. That kind of thing adds up, and the costs will continue to mount as the trial, guaranteed to be long and strange, goes on.

FOSS Patents has links to and summaries of the patents in question, which I won’t duplicate here. The trouble seems to be usual one with patent trolling, which is that the patents cover such elementary aspects of technologies today that it’s hard to imagine a device or service that does not infringe.

For instance, two of the patents more or less cover the storage and processing of mapping data centrally, and pushing out only, say, route and traffic data to a mobile device. It’s hard to believe that such a thing could be patented in the first place, as it is the natural method for any internet-enabled device to show a map. Hindsight does leave us with the impression that such things are natural or inevitable, when certainly not all are, but these patents don’t strike one as inventive.

Says BT: “It is a well-considered claim and we believe there is a strong case of infringement.” Says Google: “We believe these claims are without merit, and we will defend vigorously against them.”

Right now there isn’t much to add; the litigation will probably go on for some time as Google files countersuits and attempts to invalidate the BT patents or prove in some other way that Google is not liable for damages. We won’t bore you with the weekly victories and setbacks (they grew tiring in Samsung v. Apple and would do so here) but will post the more important updates.

You can read the full complaint from BT here.

Few people are satisfied with the current American healthcare system. It gets more expensive while innovations that actually improve the patient experience are rare. While there may be innovative new treatments and surgeries, basic functions like tracking health-related expenses or dealing with insurance companies to pay a hospital bill are still a pain.

Some well known investors are getting more interested in health startups. Marc Andreessen thinks healthcare is up next for transformation. Fred Wilson is more skeptical but says he’s in the “looking and studying” phase and compares healthcare to education, which he recently started investing in.

Rock Health is an SF-based incubator for health startups that was founded on the idea that there is a huge opportunity to improve the experience for health consumers. Last week, the company announced its newest batch of startups. Their goal is to assist health startups with issues the average non-healthcare, consumer tech company doesn’t need to address, like government regulations and institutional sales to health providers.

What are some examples of health startups? Omadahealth uses group-based programs to prevent chronic diseases like diabetes. Bitgym turns boring exercise into a fun game. Cake Health, a Disrupt SF 2011 Finalist, tracks your health care expenses and catches billing errors.

In the interview above, Rock Health co-founder Halle Tecco and program director Leslie Ziegler discuss what kinds of challenges health startups face and how they can help. Halle tells the story of what inspired her to start Rock Health. And they share thoughts on the biggest opportunities in the space.