Up With the Static and the Radio Waves
by Chris
Federico Viticci, on how iPhone and iPad apps are helping him stay healthy:
I want to be healthier, I want to eat better, and I want to take the second chance I was given and make the most of it. What started as an experiment has become a new daily commitment to improve my lifestyle and focus. And it wouldn’t be possible without my iPhone.
by Chris
Let’s call self-driving cars what they really are – autos.
What to do in a future where most jobs are humans need not apply?
Via Twitter tweets.
by Chris
Using a specific ratio of asian people to black people to women to white men, we want to make sure we represent your needs and interests or at least a version of your skin colour in our ads.
Based on an article at McSweeneys using stock footage from dissolve.com.
by Chris
When I see a story this big, I say “Whoah”
Great promo video for the new Breaking News site, as well as a great back story on the video’s production by Adam Lisagor.
I can’t wait for the inevitable wikipedia entry that links all of the Sandwich Video productions together in one long story arc.
by Chris
At one point as I climbed the stairs and approached the second floor, I saw a group of five people wearing Google Glass, all silently staring off into space. I couldn’t tell if they were wirelessly having a conversation through their eyeballs, or just bored by the presence of real humans in front of them.
Nick Bilton writes from the Google I/O 2013 conference.
I love new technology. I love lots of new things Google is doing. But Google Glass scares me because people already disappear from reality into their phones – and that’s with a physical thing they have to make a choice to pull out of their pockets and use. And these are decidedly non-tech people.
Imagine giving those same folks even more immersive, distracting technology that they don’t have to make any sort of obvious external signal that they’re using? At least right now when some dumb parent drives through a school zone with their face down in their phone, you know what they were doing.
If they’re wearing a pair of Google Glass(es), you’d have no idea.
I think a lot of the new stuff we’re being sold in technology is too powerful for the average person. At least on a societal level. It’s like giving a 16 year old a brand new Ferrari for their first vehicle. Or maybe a loaded up semi truck.
And parents can’t teach their kids about proper phone/device usage etiquette because they don’t know how to handle it either.
As someone who loves new technology it worries me how poorly I see people handling and coping with new technology as it invades their lives. And it scares me that it often feels like I, the guy who loves new technology, am the only one noticing it.
It should be the other way around, no?
See also: Technology is Evil, Long Live Technology.
by Chris
It isn’t only that young people are kept awake by messaging their friends or using the internet. The light from the screen, held close to the face, is physically disruptive to the natural onset of sleep.
From BBC News: Lack of sleep blights pupils’ education.
I hear of a lot of people who complain about not being able to sleep and then talk about how when they can’t sleep, they stick a bright, flashing, animated light up close to their face as if that’s going to help.
As Dr. Karrie Fitzpatrick is quoted as saying in the article:
Having a computer screen that is eight inches away from your face is going to expose you to a lot more light than watching a television on the opposite side of the room.
I’m not saying you can’t ever use an iPhone before bed – I do it all the time reading articles I’ve queued up in Instapaper – but I don’t complain about a lack of sleep and then not look at the most obvious reason shining right in my face. 1