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Every person’s face is unique. We intuitively know that to be true. But what exactly makes your face different from another person? And how can we measure and quantify that difference to make the world more accessible for the visually impaired?

In this episode, journalist Shaun Raviv tells us how he uncovered the top secret history of facial recognition technology and its inventor, Woody Bledsoe. Then Karthik Kannan explains how a conversation with a group of visually impaired students inspired him to build glasses that can recognize human faces.

In the 1960’s, funded by an undercover CIA front company, Woody Bledsoe built the first facial recognition software that could identify human faces. Woody was years ahead of other researchers but never got credit for his work because of the project’s classified designation.

Until recently, like many others in the industry, Karthik had never heard of Woody Bledsoe. But his company Envision is literally manifesting the dream of computer aided sight that Woody first dreamt up more than 50 years ago. Using Google Glass technology, he’s built glasses that can tell a visually impaired user what’s nearby, give visual information about an object or environment and, of course, recognize faces.

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In an age where gas-powered vehicles account for nearly half of greenhouse gas emissions in the transportation sector, electric vehicles are a way to help slow global warming. Over the last decade, the EV industry grew by leaps and bounds and Tesla has arguably done more for the industry than any other company. But the next big thing for EVs… might be making them smaller.

In this episode, Wally Rippel remembers gazing out his classroom window at the air pollution hanging over LA one smoggy day and how that led to building what would become GM’s infamous EV1. Then Wim Ouboter recalls how his homemade push scooter started a chain of events that inspired him to build a miniature electric bubble car named the car.com/en/microlino">Microlino.

In 1968, Wally converted an old VW microbus to electric drive and raced it across the country. By 1990, he was designing the prototype for the world’s first commercially available electric vehicle of the modern era. It had the design, it had the buzz. But most EV1s ended up in the crusher and some believe GM sabotaged their own project.

Wim's Microlino is an extension of the work done by Wally and other EV pioneers. It embodies the mobility.com/en/experience-micro/micro-mobility/micro-mobility">‘micro-mobility’ philosophy he first imagined while building his scooter empire and has environmental benefits that bigger EV’s can’t match.

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Once you complete the survey, you’ll be entered into a draw for a chance to win one of five Apple gift cards each worth $100. Thank you so much for your feedback and I can’t wait to hear your thoughts! 

At our core, humans are storytellers. And books are one of the oldest technologies we use to document and preserve our stories. But the printed book has remained relatively unchanged for hundreds of years so it might just be ready for a makeover.

In this episode, Greg Newby tells us the story of his friend Michael Hart who, roused by an impressive display of fireworks one 4th of July, invented the eBook. Then Manolis Kelaidis explains how he designed a new print/digital hybrid book that got the attention of Penguin publishing and big Silicon Valley investors.

In 1971, more than 30 years before the first eReader, Michael Hart founded Project Gutenberg, the world’s first electronic digital library. With the help of volunteers, he slowly transcribed literary works in the public domain into eBooks and shared them online. Librarians and publishers openly condemned Project Gutenberg and many thought the idea of reading books on a computer was downright wacky.

The eBook marked the first major change to book technology since Gutenberg invented the printing press. The next big evolution is Manolis’ bitbook. The bitbook is a printed, paper book with circuits embedded in the pages, connected by Bluetooth to nearby devices, posed to come alive with additional media to entirely reinvented the reading experience.

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In just one hour, the earth catches enough solar energy to power the world for a year. Big solar farms, home installations and increasingly efficient solar cells are slowly, but surely, converting more and more of the sun’s energy into electricity every year. And some of the poorest people, living in the most remote villages have helped usher in this new era of solar power.

In this episode, you'll hear how Calvin Fuller’s difficult childhood and adolescent interest in explosives catalyzed the invention of the first silicon solar cell. Then Bob Freling explains how witnessing the installation of a solar panel in a remote Chinese village changed his life forever.

In 1954, Calvin Fuller and a team at labs.com/about/history/">Bell Labs, built a solar cell that could convert 6% of the sun’s energy into electricity. The technology’s potential captured imaginations and even helped power the first satellites launched into space. But applications here on earth proved harder to find.

But Bob Freling found a terrestrial application that’s making an outsized impact. Bob, working with the Solar Electric Light Fund (SELF), has helped more than 1-million people around the  world who can’t access the electrical grid use solar to do a lot more than turn on the lights. His story takes us to the African country of Benin where local farmers are using solar power to fight drought and increase food security.

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There are over 20-billion connected wireless devices in the world today. So right now, whether you’re sitting on your couch or on your way to work, there are likely dozens of invisible WiFi signals all around you. But what if we didn’t get our data from WiFi routers?

In this episode, filmmaker Alexandra Dean tells the story of Hollywood starlet Hedy Lamarr and how she invented what became the basis for WiFi and wireless communication. Then Harald Haas explains how he’s reinventing wireless communication by turning light bulbs into wireless transmitters or, as he calls it, LiFi.

In the 1940s, Hedy Lamarr was leading a secret double life. By day she was a famous actress known as the most beautiful woman in the world.  By night she was building an uncrackable wireless communication device to help allied torpedos destroy Nazi submarines. Unfortunately, the world was more interested in what she was wearing than what she was thinking.  

Nearly 70 years later, Harald built on Hedy’s legacy when he discovered how to wirelessly transmit data using light. His story takes us to the TED stage where he first unveiled LiFi and reveals how the technology can bring the internet to some of the world’s most remote locations.

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Your cell phone is more than just a phone. It’s your camera, address book, wallet, alarm clock, music player, map, newspaper… you get the point. And it’s changed how we interact with each other and how we navigate the world. And no cell phone has been quite as revolutionary as the iPhone.

In this episode, Marty Cooper relives the rivalry between Motorola and Bell for cellular supremacy and the historic call he made using the world’s first cell phone. Then Bas Ordering gives us a behind the scenes look into working with Steve Jobs at Apple and helping design the iPhone.

With the help of his fellow engineers at Motorola in 1973, Marty Cooper built the world’s first cell phone. Today, the cell phone and wireless communication are the glue of the global economy. But back in the day, plenty of naysayers thought the market for cell phones was too small to warrant investment.

Over the next three decades, cell phones got smaller, less expensive, and more reliable. But it wasn’t until the release of the first iPhone in 2007 that we’d see the next big disruption. Bas helped develop many of the iPhone’s pioneering design features that transformed the cell phone into a multifunctional device many depend on to be productive and stay connected.

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If you want a taste of just how profoundly the digital age changed photography, consider this: more pictures will be taken worldwide in the next two minutes, than were taken during the first 150 years of photography.

In this episode, Steven Sasson remembers how he tinkered with a weird new image sensing technology called CCDs to invent the gallery.html">world's first digital camera. Then we’ll hear from his good friend Eric Fossum who explains how he miniaturized that technology to help NASA explore the solar system.

In 1972, Steven walked into the boardroom at Kodak to demonstrate his new, all electronic camera. He held in his hands the future of photography but the corporate execs in the room, to their own demise, couldn’t see beyond its expensive price tag.

Two decades later, Eric Fossum miniaturized Steven’s imaging technology, effectively fitting an entire digital camera on a single computer chip. He named his innovation the C-MOS image sensor and without it, there would be no smartphone cameras. Today, his new startup is tackling the next era of digital photography to help us see deeper into space than ever before.

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When you think of virtual reality, your next thought is probably gaming. And while it’s certainly a mainstay in the gaming industry, VR has more applications than you realize.

In this episode, Tom Zimmerman remembers how his love for air guitar spawned the development of his groundbreaking VR technology that would morph into the Nintendo Power Glove. Then Bob Crockett tells the story of how a college dropout convinced him to start a VR company that could one day transform healthcare.  

Tom’s original glove was vital in helping build the VR industry in the 1980s, but it wasn't suited for gaming and would go down in history as one of the gaming industry’s big flops. But where the Power Glove fell short, a new glove is reinventing the VR experience. 

Bob Crockett and Jake Rubin founded HaptX with the goal of creating a virtual experience that was indistinguishable from the real world. Their DK2 VR glove, which can replicate almost any kind of tactile sensation, has brought them one step closer to making that a reality.

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Welcome to a new show about the tech underdogs no one realized would shape the future. You'll explore the forgotten origins of today’s most transformative technology and relive the eureka moments of the people who first imagined it. Discover why these inventors struggled to get their ideas off the ground and meet the next generation of innovators building on the work of the tech pioneers who came before them.