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Why We Probably Won’t Use Twitter Music

By Tom Hawking on

We wrote yesterday about what we were expecting from Twitter’s much-anticipated new music application, based on the tidbits of information that were already available. It turns out that the application arrived earlier than we expected, launching this morning, and we’ve spent the last couple of hours playing around with it. So what is it, what does it do, and most importantly, is it any good? Read on to find out. … Read More

Books

A Selection of Fascinating E-book Innovations From the Past Year

By Emily Temple on

For all the continued hand-wringing about the end of books, there’s equal (if slightly more tentative) excitement about the realm of e-books and all the nebulous possibilities therein. We’ve noticed a recent distinct uptick in announcements about innovations and new initiatives in the last few weeks and months, so we’ve collected a few of the ones that most interest us here. Check them out after the jump, and let us know which other e-reader developments have got your interest piqued in the comments. … Read More

Music

Everything We Know About Twitter Music So Far

By Tom Hawking on

It emerged this morning that Twitter has chosen a kinda interesting promotional strategy for its new music application: as per The Verge, the company seems to have given pre-release copies of the application to various musicians, who’ve duly been tweeting about how “rad” and “jammin” and “epic” it is. But what exactly is it? And how’s it going to work? No one besides these musicians (who have presumably been sworn to secrecy) knows yet, but we’ve got some educated guesses, along with some unanswered questions. … Read More

Tech

Flavorpill’s Guide to SXSWi 2013

By Leah Taylor on

SXSW is a game of strategy, a test of endurance. But, as always, we’re here to help you make the most of your trip to Austin. Here are our top ten picks (by day) for SXSW Interactive 2013. If you want even more recommendations, check out our SXSW site, where curators like Dennis Crowley, Jessica Lawrence of NYTM, Thrillist’s Ben Lerer, and more are posting their suggestions. Or, join us at the Flavorpill Sanctuary for a daily KIND breakfast, boot camps and yoga classes provided by Crunch Gyms, spin classes from CYC Fitness, and a juice bar, plus afternoon dance parties presented by Microsoft. For an even more interactive experience at the fest, check out our friends at Kismet, a social discovery app that helps uncover hidden connections for people in the same location. All of Flavorpill’s events will be listed on the app during SXSW. … Read More

Tech

Twitter Reacts to Facebook’s New Graph Search

By Caroline Stanley on

Earlier today Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced the “third pillar” of his social network — a new search tool called Graph Search, which will leverage Facebook’s one billion members’ 240 billion photos and 1 trillion interpersonal connections. “People use search engines to answer questions,” he explains in this in-depth piece on Wired. “But we can answer a set of questions that no one else can really answer. All those other services are indexing primarily public information, and stuff in Facebook isn’t out there in the world — it’s stuff that people share. There’s no real way to cut through the contents of what people are sharing, to fulfill big human needs about discovery, to find people you wouldn’t otherwise be connected with. And we thought we should do something about that. We’re the only service in the world that can do that.”

While we’re still figuring out what exactly this means for your Facebook privacy, let alone the future of sites like Yelp or even Google, we’ve collected some of the best initial tweets in response to the new feature after the jump. Let us know in the comments if you plan to get on the waiting list to give it a try. … Read More

Tech

10 New Gadgets You Can’t Live Without

By Julia Pugachevsky on

At last week’s Consumer Electronics Show, consumers were introduced to an assortment of new and exciting products, ranging from Razer Edge, the PC-gaming tablet and Best of Show winner, to Fitbit Flex, a cute, comfortable rubber bracelet that helps you track your fitness goals. But, while these are all great, there are a lot of new gadgets that seem more like necessities than, well, gadgets. Here are our top ten technological tools that we have no idea how we’ve lived without before now. … Read More

Tech

An Exclusive Interview With DIY Space Travel Doc Producer Xavier Aaronson

By Claire Cottrell on

DIY space travel might seem an unbelievably far cry from the rubber-stamped holiday cards, quickie door swags, and twig push-pins you finally tackled, but as a fascinating new documentary explains, it’s not (really). Art writer, producer and museum babe watcher extraordinaire, Xavier Aaronson, hopped across the pond to spend time with the founders of Copenhagen Suborbitals, a semi-new, but surprisingly unknown open source, non-profit organization that is changing the intergalactic game as we know it.

We sat down with Xavier to talk about his time in the chilly Danish capital and to hear firsthand why homemade space travel isn’t actually that daunting. Click through to learn about the fascinating future of this inspiring approach to micro space crafts, along with Aaronson’s space travel essentials and hot tips for where to eat, party, and play in Copenhagen. … Read More

Tech

Pac-Man, Tetris Among MoMA’s First Video Game Acquisitions

By Judy Berman on

“But it’s art, Ma.” Teenagers, rejoice, for MoMA has legitimized what you’ve been telling your parents for years. The museum has announced its first video game acquisitions, a collection that includes 14 titles ranging from classics like Pac-Man and Tetris to more contemporary game-design paragons including Katamari Damacy and Portal. According to Paola Antonelli, Senior Curator in the Department of Architecture and Design, this is only the beginning of “an initial wish list of about 40 to be acquire in the near future.” Kottke points out that Nintendo titles are conspicuously absent, likely because negotiations with the company are still in progress. Check out the rest of the games MoMA bought, all of which will be on view (and, we assume, available for playing) at the museum in March 2013, after the jump. … Read More

Tech

Watch Old Computer Equipment Play Dylan’s “The Times They Are A-Changin’”

By Caroline Stanley on

Bob Dylan is one of the most frequently covered artists we can think of, and yet we can’t recall ever seeing one of his songs re-imagined quite like this. Using a pile of old photocopiers, modems, scanners, fax machines, and hard drives, director Chris Cairns has created a computer orchestra that can play a surprisingly rousing version of “The Times They Are A-Changin’,” thanks a little programming magic by Isthisgood?. Click through to behold the resulting video, Scrapheap Symphony, and let us know in the comments what you think Bobby D would make of it. … Read More

Tech

Watch NASA’s Footage of the Birth of Hurricane Sandy

By Caroline Stanley on

Before it was slowly pummeling the entire Eastern Seaboard as one of the largest hurricanes ever to strike the US, Hurricane Sandy was just a tiny wisp of clouds floating over Central America — or at least that’s the way it appears in this fascinating animation from NASA’s GOES-EAST satellite, which we spotted over on The Atlantic. Watch the first 10 days of this storm’s life — as seen from space and condensed into just 20 seconds — after the jump, and if you’ve got an interesting Sandy-related photo to share, email us here! … Read More