Category: reading

Some recent saved favorites from Pocket:

NFL, Major League Baseball Warn That Aereo Could Trigger End of Free TV Game Broadcasts: The National Football League and Major League Baseball are urging the Supreme Court to grant broadcasters’ petition to hear their challenge to the legality of Aereo, the startup that features unauthorized streams of local broadcast signals. – http://variety.com/2013/tv/news/nfl-major-league-baseball-warn-supreme-court-that-aereo-could-trigger-end-to-games-on-free-tv-1200847089/

Samsung Elec says Gear smartwatch sales hit 800,000 in two months: SEOUL (Reuters) – Samsung Electronics Co said on Tuesday its Galaxy Gear has become the world’s most popular smartwatch with sales reaching 800,000 since its debut two months ago, defying some market concerns the accessory would fail due to a lack of compelling features. – by Miyoung Kim – Tags: United Kingdom, United States, David Pogue – http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/11/19/us-samsung-gear-idUSBRE9AI0AU20131119

‘Selfie’ is the 2013 Oxford Dictionaries Word of the Year: Last year Oxford University Press split its word of the year honors between the US and the UK, but for 2013 there’s one word to rule them all — and it is “selfie.” The term beat out contenders like twerk, bitcoin, and binge-watch, due largely to its remarkable uptick in usage. – by Bryan Bishop – http://www.theverge.com/2013/11/18/5120390/selfie-is-the-2013-oxford-dictionaries-word-of-the-year

Silver Spring seeks new profits from smart-city infrastructure: Wish your home town had network-enabled streetlights? A company called Silver Spring Networks does, and Tuesday it unveiled a service designed to make the technology and other networked infrastructure more affordable. – by Stephen Shankland – http://m.cnet.com/news/silver-spring-seeks-new-profits-from-smart-city-infrastructure/57612919

Ex-Google-Wallet Creators Raise $7M To Rethink In-Store Retail Data: Can a team of ex-Googlers reinvent the antiquated physical retail space in the mold of Amazon? Amazon, the world’s largest online retailer, has a huge advantage over its brick-and-mortar counterparts: data. – http://m.fastcompany.com/3021865/ex-google-wallet-creators-raise-7m-to-rethink-in-store-retail-data

Qualcomm’s Toq Smartwatch Shows Off The Future Of Displays – ReadWrite: Qualcomm may not seem like a company that would make a big splash in the smartwatch Arm Race. After all, Qualcomm has long been known to make the pieces that go inside people’s gadgets, not the gadgets themselves. – http://readwrite.com/2013/11/18/qualcomms-toq-smartwatch-shows-off-the-future-of-displays

The Rise of Twitter Bots: Last Tuesday, Google decided that I was a spammer, and I lost access to my e-mail for twelve hours. It was my fault. One of my Twitter accounts, RealHumanPraise, was mentioned on “The Colbert Report,” where I work as a writer, at 11:46 P.M. – by Rob Dubbin – Tags: elements, technology, techpages, twitter – http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/elements/2013/11/the-rise-of-twitter-bots.html

The : The dusty landscape of the American West is dotted with enormous concrete arrows. They look like cryptic messages from a primitive civilization — a civilization that was obsessed with westward expansion. And that assessment wouldn’t be altogether wrong. – by Matt Novak – http://paleofuture.gizmodo.com/the-highway-of-light-that-guided-early-planes-across-1466696698/@kcampbelldollaghan

Hitlist lets you know when its cheap to fly to your dream destinations: Timing is everything when it comes to snagging deals, and the travel and flight booking domain is no different. Hitlist is an app that aims to help travelers find the best deals to their favorite destinations, taking the hassle (and some of the expense) out of booking air travel. – by Jon Russell – http://thenextweb.com/apps/2013/11/19/hitlist-lets-you-know-when-its-cheap-to-fly-to-your-dream-destinations/

Some recent saved favorites from Pocket:

Bitcoin Mining Chips, a High-Tech Arms Race: The easiest way to get a Bitcoin is to buy one. You can join drug dealers, speculators, and the curious by hopping onto an online exchange and purchasing one unit of the digital currency for, as of Nov. 11, about $340. – by Ashlee Vance – Tags: – http://mobile.businessweek.com/articles/2013-11-14/2014-outlook-bitcoin-mining-chips-a-high-tech-arms-race

Why Google Play Music All Access beats Spotify hands down: Ever since Spotify was launched I’ve been a subscriber and huge fan of the service. I’ve sworn by it for years and have built extremely large playlists on the service and synchronized them with all of my devices. – by Owen Williams – http://thenextweb.com/google/2013/11/16/google-play-music-going-kill-spotify/

Offices For All! Why Open-Office Layouts Are Bad For Employees, Bosses, And Productivity: In part one of our two-part series, Fast Company senior editor Jason Feifer makes a case for giving all workers a little alone time–behind an office door. I had an office. Now I don’t. – http://www.fastcompany.com/3019758/dialed/offices-for-all-why-open-office-layouts-are-bad-for-employees-bosses-and-productivity

Rap Genius and Sony/ATV Reveal Licensing Deal (Exclusive): Rap Genius, the online lyric site with financial backing from Silicon Valley heavyweights, has signed its first licensing deal. Billboard has learned the Brooklyn-based startup has a licensing agreement with Sony/ATV Music Publishing. A Rap Genius statement says the deal was finalized “earlier this year.” – by Glenn Peoples – http://www.billboard.com/biz/articles/news/digital-and-mobile/5793024/rap-genius-and-sonyatv-reveal-licensing-deal-exclusive

How Amazon is building substations, laying fiber and generally doing everything to keep cloud costs down — Tech News and Analysis: If there’s anyone still left wondering how it is that large cloud providers can keep on rolling out new features and lowering their prices even when no one is complaining about them, Amazon Web Services Vice President and Distinguished Engineer James Hamilton spelled out the answer in one word d – by Derrick Harris – Tags: AWS: Reinvent,Cloud Computing,Data Centers,energy efficiency,iaas,Web Infrastructure – http://gigaom.com/2013/11/15/how-amazon-is-building-substations-laying-fiber-and-generally-doing-everything-to-keep-cloud-costs-down/

Facebook, Still Dominant, Strives to Keep Cachet: When Evan Spiegel peered into a crystal ball to divine a future for his company, Snapchat, he did not see Facebook. He saw something else, something much bigger — a social network that could exist on its own, outside Facebook. – by JENNA WORTHAM, NICOLE PERLROTH, VINDU GOEL – http://www.nytimes.com/2013/11/18/technology/facebook-strives-to-keep-its-cachet.html

Snap Out of It: Kids Aren’t Reliable Tech Predictors: I believe the children aren’t our future. Teach them well, but when it comes to determining the next big thing in tech, let’s not fall victim to the ridiculous idea that they lead the way. Yes, I’m talking about Snapchat. – by Farhad Manjoo – http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702303559504579202623459037550

Xbox One Vs. PS4: The Console Wars Are Just Getting Started: It’s quite possible that all that momentum Sony’s Sony’s had leading up to the launch of the PS4 will dry up now that the machine is in the wild. System issues, faulty HDMI ports, and a real lack of compelling first-party games all work against the next-gen console. – by Erik Kain – http://www.forbes.com/sites/erikkain/2013/11/16/xbox-one-vs-ps4-the-console-wars-are-just-getting-started/

The Giphoscope turns your favorite GIF into a hand-cranked work of art: If you were to accuse us of being fans of GIFs we wouldn’t disagree, but what happens when you want to share that perfect, singular moment away from the confines of a computer screens? One particularly beautiful solution is called The Giphoscope. – by Bryan Bishop – http://www.theverge.com/2013/11/17/5112314/the-giphoscope-turns-your-favorite-gif-into-a-hand-cranked-work-of-art

Some recent saved favorites from Pocket:

The Lean Hardware Startup: From Prototype To Production: Editor’s note: Cyril Ebersweiler is the founder of the pioneering hardware startup accelerator HAXLR8R (which is now looking for applicants) and Partner at SOSVentures. Benjamin Joffe is an expert on startup ecosystems, angel investor and Advisor at HAXLR8R. – by Benjamin Joffe, Cyril Ebersweiler – http://techcrunch.com/2013/11/16/the-lean-hardware-startup-from-prototype-to-production/

Chris Hadfield Space Oddity : Interview with author of An Astronaut’s Guide to Life on Earth.: Chris Hadfield is a retired Canadian astronaut and former commander of the International Space Station, where he spent five months earlier this year. His book is An Astronaut’s Guide to Life on Earth. – by Jacob Aron – http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/new_scientist/2013/11/chris_hadfield_space_oddity_interview_with_author_of_an_astronaut_s_guide.html

Robot Cowboys, Apple’s Starship Campus, and Slimy Starfish: This Week’s Must-Reads: It’s been a long week. You haven’t had much time to devote to keeping current on the news. We get it. But now it’s the weekend and complaining about your significant other to your friends is not a fruitful topic of conversation. – by Daniela Hernandez – http://www.wired.com/opinion/2013/11/wireddozen1116/

Apple reportedly buys Kinect tech-creator PrimeSense: Apple has reportedly acquired PrimeSense, the motion-tracking company responsible for the technology in the original Xbox 360 Kinect, in a deal said to be worth around $345m. – by Chris Davies – http://www.slashgear.com/apple-reportedly-buys-kinect-tech-creator-primesense-17305684/

Ubiquitous cameras: ABOUT halfway through Dave Eggers’s bestselling dystopian satire on Silicon Valley, “The Circle”, the reader meets Stewart, a bald, silent, stooped 60-year-old who has “been filming, recording, every moment of his life now for five years”. – by From the print – http://www.economist.com/news/briefing/21589863-it-getting-ever-easier-record-anything-or-everything-you-see-opens

Apple Stores to implement iBeacon location technology to improve service, boost sales: An iBeacon system could allow a store to install transmitters that would wirelessly connect to an iPhone and tell the phone its location with respect to items on shelves. This iPhone could then perform additional functionality if it is equipped with a specialized application. – by Mark Gurman – http://9to5mac.com/2013/11/16/apple-stores-to-implement-ibeacon-location-technology-to-improve-service-boost-sales/

Pinterest Launches Its First API, And It’s All About Big Brands: Zappos, Walmart, Disney In First User Group: Pinterest is today, at long last, releasing its first API for developers, which will let third-party sites embed Pinterest pins, and make it easier to post content into Pinterest itself. – by Ingrid Lunden – http://techcrunch.com/2013/11/14/pinterest-launches-its-first-apis-partners-with-zappos-walmart-disney-nestle-random-house-hearst-on-first-rollout/

Here comes the age of ambient everything: Wait, what the heck is ambient news? Pew uses that phrase to characterize the experience of getting news in social streams, especially on the social sites Reddit, Twitter and Facebook. – by Mike Elgan – http://m.computerworld.com/s/article/9244093/Here_comes_the_age_of_ambient_everything

Lessons the American Girl store can teach Silicon Valley: PALO ALTO — Starting about 7 a.m. Saturday in a corner of the Stanford Shopping Center, hundreds of girls under the age of 11 will begin lining up for an event that many of them have been dreaming about for years now: the grand opening of an American Girl store. – by Chris O’Brien – http://www.latimes.com/business/technology/la-fi-tn-american-girl-store-silicon-valley-20131115,0,2323348.story

If this doesn’t terrify you… Google’s computers OUTWIT their humans: Analysis Google no longer understands how its “deep learning” decision-making computer systems have made themselves so good at recognizing things in photos. – by Jack Clark – http://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/11/15/google_thinking_machines/

This Bulletproof Suit Lets You Escape the Line of Fire in Style: Despite the classy appearance, there’s something about an exorbitantly pricey bulletproof men’s suit that screams publicity stunt. After all, besides fictional movie characters that go by 007, who in the world would ever need something like this? – by Tuan C. Nguyen – Tags: bulletproof,business,design,fashion,garrison bespoke,menswear,safety,suit – http://blogs.smithsonianmag.com/ideas/2013/11/this-bulletproof-suit-lets-you-escape-the-line-of-fire-in-style/

Some recent saved favorites from Pocket:

Sun expected to ‘flip upside down’ as magnetic field reverses its polarity: The sun’s magnetic field is about to flip upside down as it reverses its polarity. In August Nasa said the reversal would happen in three to four months time, although that it would be impossible to pinpoint a more specific date. – by Lucy Kinder – Tags: Space,Science – http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/space/10450581/Sun-expected-to-flip-upside-down-as-magnetic-field-reverses-its-polarity.html

From touch screen to touch world – welcome to mobile 2.0: Companies that make it possible for consumers to touch the real world will win as mobile becomes the platform. The world is going mobile (we know, we know) and everyone should be building for this world. – by Phineas – http://sneakerheadvc.com/2013/11/15/from-touch-screen-to-touch-world-welcome-to-mobile-2-0/#prclt-11jPpooC

Despite Financial Concerns, Cities Are Doubling Down on Bike-Share: Ongoing financial problems at PBSC (also known as Bixi), the Montréal-based bike-share equipment company, continue to ripple across North America. But even so, the continuing popularity of bike-share with the public is leading cities with PBSC contracts to call for expansion of their systems. – http://www.theatlanticcities.com/commute/2013/11/despite-financial-concerns-cities-are-doubling-down-bike-share/7604/

Leonid meteor shower will peak this weekend: Skywatchers, rejoice! The Leonid meteor shower, an annual mid-November treat, will be coming to a sky near you this weekend. The peak of the shower will be visible both Saturday and Sunday nights, according to EarthSky magazine. – by Doyle Rice, USA TODAY – http://www.usatoday.com/story/weather/2013/11/15/leonid-meteor-shower/3579823/

Gmail is boiling the frog – and we are the frog: Summary: Google’s steady push to become an intermediary for all of our communications comes at a cost – but do we care anymore about paying it? Judging by the results of the latest ZDNet Great Debate, the answer is… ribbit. – by David Braue – http://www.zdnet.com/gmail-is-boiling-the-frog-and-we-are-the-frog-7000023256/

Awesome List Of Google Now Voice Commands: In the new Android 4.4 update, Google has highly integrated its personal assistant Google Now into the KitKat home screen. It has now a dedicated panel, which can be accessed with a swipe to the left. – by Marc Knoll – http://trendblog.net/list-of-google-now-voice-commands-infographic/

Samsung Mobile-made infographic boasts its achievements in 2013: x PhoneArena is looking for new authors! To view all available positions, click here. – by Chris P. – http://www.phonearena.com/news/Samsung-Mobile-made-infographic-boasts-its-achievements-in-2013_id49380

Impressions: Our first day with the PlayStation 4 is full of surprises: We’ve had our very own PlayStation 4 here in the Ars Orbiting HQ for a little under 24 hours—not quite enough time to dig into things for a comprehensive review of a new game console. At the time of this writing, Sony has yet to enable the firmware version 1. – by Kyle Orland – http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2013/11/impressions-our-first-day-with-the-playstation-4-is-full-of-surprises/

(sorry I missed yesterday … too many flights and the red-eye and meetings killed me)

Some recent saved favorites from Pocket:

How PBS Is Reviving Carmen Sandiego: Attention gumshoes: The mystery of PBS’s Carmen Sandiego revival is solved. The network is reviving the character with a new online social game. Yep, no new shows, no old show, but a new game. Fans can help PBS solve “The Case of the Pilfered Paintbrushes” every Thursday. – by Chris Harnick – http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/11/14/pbs-carmen-sandiego_n_4276403.html

A Wonderfully Simplified Map of San Francisco’s Bicycle Infrastructure: Drivers who stop to ask Mat Kladney for directions are in for a frustrating day. Because Kladney bicycles all over San Francisco, the route he instinctively gives weaves through town like a madman’s marathon – great for cyclists, unnatural and awful for motorists. – by John Metcalfe – http://m.theatlanticcities.com/commute/2013/11/wonderfully-simplified-map-san-franciscos-bicycle-infrastructure/7554/#.UoQaZ0cm2P0.twitter

Is the Internet of Things Creating Data Hoarders?: By now, the “Internet of Things” (IoT) is something you’ve heard before. In fact, a recent Morgan Stanley report predicts that the number of devices connected to the IoT will reach 75 billion by the year 2020. – by Greg White – http://www.wired.com/insights/2013/11/is-the-internet-of-things-creating-data-hoarders/

New Glass Input Methods: Eye-Tracking, Web Control, Touch-Sensitive Clothing, and Bananas: YouTube video accompanying the post (click image to view) How we interact with a device largely determines the context that it can be used in (e.g., while driving, during a meeting) and potentially who can use it (e.g., users with disabilities). Glass supports touch gestures (e.g. – http://blog.brandynwhite.com/new-glass-input-methods_eye-tracking_touch-sensitive-clothing

What’s Wrong with Tech Writing?: Confession: I am a tech writer. So this week we learned Android was dominating the smartphone market to an extent it never has before. IDC’s figures were quoted everywhere, accompanied with many a catchy headline or turn of phrase. It’s terrible news for Apple. It’s great news for Google. – by Kit Eaton – https://medium.com/editors-picks/6809cb0ea604

The Inside Story of How the iPad Got Its Iconic Design: While Jony Ive’s group was secretly working on the iPad, Steve Jobs was telling the public and press that Apple had no intention of releasing a tablet. “Tablets appeal to rich guys with plenty of other PCs and de- vices already,” he said publicly. But Jobs was dissembling. – by Leander Kahney – http://gizmodo.com/the-inside-story-of-how-the-ipad-got-its-iconic-deisgn-1463463557

Do We Live in the Matrix?: In the 1999 sci-fi film classic The Matrix, the protagonist, Neo, is stunned to see people defying the laws of physics, running up walls and vanishing suddenly. – by Zeeya Merali – http://discovermagazine.com/2013/dec/09-do-we-live-in-the-matrix#.UoU3_GR4ayg

Instagram Is Spoiling Your Dinner: It turns out that those self-appointed ‘foodies’ clogging up your Instagram feed with photos of their latest gastronomic feat are more than just annoying – they’re literally ruining your appetite. – Tags: food, food culture, foodie, instagram, internet culture, brigham young university, university of minnesota, why do we post photos of food, ,featured,foodie culture,instagram,internet culture,psychology,social media – http://www.theconnectivist.com/2013/11/instagram-is-spoiling-your-dinner/

AmazonFresh Is Jeff Bezos’ Last Mile Quest For Total Retail Domination: Amazon upended retail, but CEO Jeff Bezos — who just bought The Washington Post for $250 million — insists it’s still “Day One.” What comes next? A relentless pursuit of cheaper goods and faster shipping. The competition is already gasping for breath. – by Pari Dukovic – http://www.fastcompany.com/3014817/amazon-jeff-bezos

Apple Store Point Of Sale Systems Go Down Again Today, Outage Continues: Some Apple Stores have had their point-of-sale systems go down repeatedly today, TechCrunch has learned. There was an extensive outage early Thursday morning and there has been an ongoing outage this evening in some stores. – by Matthew Panzarino – http://techcrunch.com/2013/11/14/apple-store-point-of-sale-systems-go-down-again-today-outage-continues/

The Best Of Fritz Kahn, The Grandfather Of Data Visualization: We’re in the golden age of infographics. Everything from the death toll in Breaking Bad to the sinking of the Titanic to trends in men’s jewelry has been rendered in fancy little charts, graphs, and maps. – http://www.fastcodesign.com/3021584/infographic-of-the-day/the-best-of-fritz-kahn-the-grandfather-of-data-visualization

Our Government Has Weaponized the Internet. Here’s How They Did It: The internet backbone — the infrastructure of networks upon which internet traffic travels — went from being a passive infrastructure for communication to an active weapon for attacks. – by Nicholas Weaver – http://www.wired.com/opinion/2013/11/this-is-how-the-internet-backbone-has-been-turned-into-a-weapon/

Pew Social Media Study: 30% Of The U.S. Gets News Via Facebook; Reddit Has The Most News-Hungry Regular Users: The Pew Research Center is today releasing comparative numbers looking at how U.S. adults use social networking sites to read news (a follow-on from earlier research focusing on two specific sites, Facebook and Twitter). This is significant for a couple of reasons. – by Ingrid Lunden – http://techcrunch.com/2013/11/14/pew-social-media-study-30-of-the-u-s-gets-news-via-facebook-reddit-has-the-most-news-hungry-regular-users/

Some recent saved favorites from Pocket:

Motorola Announces The Moto G: What The iPhone 5C Should Have Been: Motorola today announced the Moto G, a mid-market smartphone designed to give consumers a high quality experience for the fraction of the price. – by Dan Rowinski – http://readwrite.com/2013/11/13/motorola-announces-the-moto-g-the-highest-quality-budget-smartphone-on-the-market

Playstation 4: In the seven years since the introduction of the PlayStation 3, we’ve seen our gaming consoles transform into living-room hubs through constant evolution and software updates. – http://www.polygon.com/a/ps4-review

This could get messy: Giphy brings animated GIFs to your Twitter timeline: Animated GIF support is now available on Twitter. Giphy, seemingly the online database of GIFs, announced today that it is now integrated with Twitter’s Media Cards. All you need to do is simply share a GIFs URL and when it’s displayed in your Twitter timeline, it will automatically animate. – by Ken Yeung – http://thenextweb.com/twitter/2013/11/14/get-messy-giphy-brings-animated-gifs-twitter-timeline/

Newly launched Smithsonian X 3D Collection offers historical models you can print at home: We’ve already seen first-hand that the Smithsonian has a keen interest in 3D printing and modelling, and it’s now turned that interest into something of a public service with a new online collection that’s just launched today. – by Donald Melanson – http://www.engadget.com/2013/11/13/smithsonian-x-3d-collection/

What if Our Hair Dryers and Blenders Worked Like Open Source Code?: Open E-Components is a collection of appliances that combines consumer electronics functionality with Lego-like construction mechanisms. Photo: Ming-Han TsaiThe system is comprised of five basic modules: a light socket, rotating motor, air heater, immersion heater, and a heated surface. – by Joseph Flaherty – http://www.wired.com/design/2013/11/open-source-toaster/

Facebook Says Its New Data Center Will Run Entirely on Wind: Facebook passed another milestone in the green data center arms race today with the announcement that its Altoona, Iowa data center will be 100 percent powered by wind power when it goes online in 2015. – by Klint Finley – http://www.wired.com/wiredenterprise/2013/11/facebook-iowa-wind/

PS4 declassified: How Sony used its PS3 mistakes to build the ultimate developer’s console: It’s the fall of 2006 and Sony has a problem. PlayStation 3, the company’s eagerly awaited and hyperbolically marketed successor to the best-selling video game console of all time, has not been well-received. The major issue is cost. – by Tim Stevens – http://m.cnet.com/news/ps4-declassified-how-sony-used-its-ps3-mistakes-to-build-the-ultimate-developers-console/57612108

How Twitter’s new expanded images increase clicks, retweets and favorites [New data]: I recently covered some big changes that Twitter has made, and here is another one. Twitter just added inline images to tweets so that you don’t need to click a link to see an attached image, but rather the Tweet itself expands. – by Belle Beth Cooper – http://blog.bufferapp.com/the-power-of-twitters-new-expanded-images-and-how-to-make-the-most-of-it

Samsung smartphone with flexible wraparound display, that actually has a good reason to be. Launch next year: The first smartphones with flexible displays – Samsung Galaxy Round and LG G Flex, are pretty pointless devices. Samsung and LG did them for bragging rights, and simply because they could. Not because there’s something those phones can do better than handsets with traditional, flat screens. – by Stasys Bielinis – http://www.unwiredview.com/2013/11/14/heres-samsung-smartphone-with-flexible-display-that-actually-has-a-good-reason-to-be/

Under Armour Buys MapMyFitness for $150 Million: Athletic clothing brand Under Armour is buying workout app MapMyFitness for $150 million. The company plans to use the purchase to “broaden its existing digital offerings,” according to The Wall Street Journal. – by TODD WASSERMAN – http://mashable.com/2013/11/14/under-armour-mapmyfitness/

Intel Opening Retail “Experience” Stores Starting November 23rd: Intel wants to give you a chance to get up close and personal with its PCs. – by Avram Piltch – http://blog.laptopmag.com/intel-launching-retail-stores

The Dual-Screen YotaPhone Will Launch Internationally In December: Russia-based Yota Devices has been working on a curious beast called the YotaPhone for years now, and it’s gained quite a reputation for itself because of its split personality. – by Chris Velazco – http://techcrunch.com/2013/11/13/the-split-personality-yotaphone-will-launch-internationally-in-december/

Made by ex-Nokians, the first Jolla phone will go on sale this month: November 2013 is definitely the month for new technology launches, with Microsoft, Sony, and Apple all releasing some of their most anticipated products of the year within weeks of each other. – by Aaron Souppouris – http://www.theverge.com/2013/11/14/5103196/jolla-sailfish-os-smartphone-finland-release-date

Some recent saved favorites from Pocket:

UPP is a fuel cell charger for smartphones and other devices, but it’s also destined for integration: If you own a smartphone or a tablet there’s a pretty good chance that you aren’t very impressed by the battery life; while processing power and storage advances continue apace, battery technology has made only modest gains. – by Ben Woods – http://thenextweb.com/gadgets/2013/11/12/upp-fuel-cell-charger-smartphones-devices-also-destined-integration/

Cliiiimb gives real-time Strava segment feedback: Legions of riders use the social fitness product Strava now, but the company 4iiii is hoping that the promise of real-time audio and visual feedback on Strava segments will entice Strava users to buy Cliiiimb, which attaches to a pair of sunglasses. – http://m.bikeradar.com/us/road/news/article/cliiiimb-gives-real-time-strava-segment-feedback-38988/

Netflix introduces one unified TV interface to rule them all: Watch Netflix instant streaming on your television and you know what content you’ll get — but you likely won’t know how you’ll find it. – by Bryan Bishop – http://www.theverge.com/2013/11/13/5098224/netflix-introduces-one-unified-tv-interface-to-rule-them-all

SmartThings Raises $12.5 Million From Greylock And Highland To Power The Internet Of Things: Internet-of-Things startup SmartThings has spent the last year or so building a platform that people can use to connect to an increasingly wide range of devices in their homes. Now it’s getting ready to bet even bigger on those products and its platform, thanks to a $12. – by Ryan Lawler – http://techcrunch.com/2013/11/12/smartthings-12-5m-greylock-highland/

Apple will launch 1.7” iWatch for men and 1.3” iWatch for women next year: Several weeks ago we’ve heard that Apple is experimenting with several iWatch display sizes. Now it seems that this may be more than experiment. Apple may have already decided to launch two wearable devices next year – 1.7” iWatch for men and 1.3” iWatch for women. – by Stasys Bielinis – http://www.unwiredview.com/2013/11/13/apple-will-launch-1-7-iwatch-for-men-and-1-3-iwatch-for-women-next-year/

The Absurd Beauty of Creating Musical Turnstiles in NYC’s Subway: There are so many good subway sounds: the whoosh and clatter of a train approaching, the click of a turnstile, armies of boots on cement echoing through strange, low-ceilinged corridors, people playing love songs that the rats know by heart. – by Alexis C. Madrigal – Tags: The Atlantic, The Atlantic Magazine, TheAtlantic.com, Atlantic, news, opinion, breaking news, analysis, commentary, business, politics, culture, international, science, technology, national and life – http://m.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2013/11/the-absurd-beauty-of-creating-musical-turnstiles-in-nycs-subway/281406/

Google Is Bigger Than Magazines And Newspapers: Google has become so big that sometimes it’s difficult to understand just how big it is. It’s on course to do $60 billion in revenue this year, almost all of that from advertising. But how big is that in terms of the media it competes against for ad dollars? – by Jim Edwards – Tags: Google, Ignition 2013, Chart Of The Day, Jim Edwards – http://www.businessinsider.com/google-is-bigger-than-all-magazines-and-newspapers-combined-2013-11

Some recent saved favorites from Pocket:

Should Tech Designers Go With Their Guts — Or the Data?: For many tech companies, design is no longer subjective. Instead, it’s all about the data. Analytics click and hum behind the scenes, measuring the effectiveness of even the tiniest design decisions. – by Braden Kowitz – http://www.wired.com/opinion/2013/11/design-world-stop-fighting-over-data-vs-instinct/

Facebook likes wearable technology, but the tech’s not quite ready to like back: We’ve become accustomed to posts flooding our news feeds proclaiming that a friend has just completed a 5-mile run or taken their 3,000th step of the day, but that’s not enough for Facebook. At a recent hackathon held at its headquarters in Menlo Park, Calif. – by Michael Gorman – http://www.engadget.com/2013/11/10/facebook-wearables-hackathon/

Motiif “M” smart trench coat offers integrated 4G LTE and smartphone charger: Wearable technology is mostly limited to smartwatches and smart glasses, though other types have been — and actively are — being developed. A particularly unique type is clothing, of which we’ve seen samples in the past. – by Brittany Hillen – http://www.slashgear.com/motiif-m-smart-trench-coat-offers-integrated-4g-lte-and-smartphone-charger-11305030/

Apple Finds Surprising Growth Market in Japan: Apple Inc. AAPL -0.29% is striking gold in an unlikely place: Japan. In the past two years, Japan has emerged as Apple’s fastest-growing region, far outpacing its home market and the booming economies of Greater China and the rest of Asia. – by Daisuke Wakabayashi – http://online.wsj.com/news/article_email/SB10001424052702304672404579185940386164788-lMyQjAxMTAzMDAwNzEwNDcyWj

Google Relents on YouTube Ad Measurement: For about two years, Google Inc. GOOG -0.54% refused to let Nielsen Holdings NLSN -0.28% place measurement tags on ads running on YouTube, a stance that media buyers say stopped some advertisers buying time on the online video site. – by Suzanne Vranica – http://online.wsj.com/news/article_email/SB10001424052702303914304579192211449903486-lMyQjAxMTAzMDEwMTExNDEyWj

Same Time, Same Channel? TV Woos Kids Who Can’t Wait: When Eric Nelson’s 6-year-old daughter, Charlotte, and 10-year-old son, Asa, discover that they cannot rewind or fast-forward a TV show, they are perplexed — and their father is, too. It is hard to explain the limitations of live television to children who have grown up in an on-demand world. – by BRIAN STELTER – http://www.nytimes.com/2013/11/11/business/media/same-time-same-channel-tv-woos-kids-who-cant-wait.html

Shafted Again.: Can we ever get a break? Apparently not. – by BikeSnobNYC – http://bikesnobnyc.blogspot.com/2013/11/shafted-again.html

New invention ‘harvests’ electricity from background radiation and could be used to beam power to remote locations or recharge phones wirelessly: Engineers at Duke University have designed a breakthrough gadget that ‘harvests’ background microwave radiation and converts it into electricity, with the same efficiency as solar panels. – by Daily Mail Reporter – Tags: engineers,duke university,allen hawkes,alexander katko,steven cummer, – http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2493931/New-device-harvests-electricity-background-radiation-like-Wi-Fi.html

Shopify now allows stores to accept Bitcoin: E-commerce platform Shopify is already tackling the world’s newest form of currency. Today, the company announced that it now supports Bitcoin payment through Bitpay on checkout for stores using the platform. – by Owen Williams – http://thenextweb.com/insider/2013/11/09/shopify-now-accepts-bitcoin-purchases/

More iPhone buyers switching from Android this year than in 2012: New research by Consumer Intelligence Research Partners, based on interviews of 400 new iPhone 5s and 5c buyers, indicates that an increasing proportion of Apple’s customers are coming from Android compared to last year. – by Daniel Eran Dilger – Tags: Apple, Apple Inc, iPhone, iPad, iPod touch, iPod nano, Apple TV, Apple, iPod shuffle, iTunes, i mac, mac os x, mac osx, Apple Computer, Apple Computer Inc., Mac OS X, iMac, iBook, Mac Pro, MacBook Pro, Magic Pad, Magic Mouse, iPod classic, App Store, iTunes Store, iBook Store, mac book, Microsoft, Adobe, Research in Motion, RIM, Nokia, Samsung, Google, Nvidia, Intel – http://appleinsider.com/articles/13/11/11/more-iphone-buyers-switching-from-android-this-year-than-in-2012

Some recent saved favorites from Pocket:

Amazon to Begin Sunday Deliveries, With Post Office’s Help: Amazon.com Inc. will begin delivering packages on Sundays in the nation’s two largest cities later this month with an unlikely partner—the United States Postal Service. – by Greg Bensinger – http://m.us.wsj.com/article_email/SB10001424052702304868404579190091121691258-lMyQjAxMTAzMDEwMDExNDAyWj

Instagram and Youtube — Benedict Evans: Instagram is looking like a great acquisition. It had 30m users when Facebook bought it in April 2012, and has now passed 150m, just 18m later. – by Benedict Evans – http://ben-evans.com/benedictevans/2013/11/10/instagram-and-youtube

Five reasons why smartwatches are here to stay: Whether they love or hate them, everyone has an opinion on the viability of smartwatches. The disparate range of opinions is a clear sign that we are on the brink of the next wave of computing. – by Tom Emrich – Tags: smartwatches, mobile, cell, canada, wearbles – http://mobilesyrup.com/2013/11/09/five-reasons-why-smartwatches-are-here-to-stay/

A Cure for the Allergy Epidemic?: WILL the cure for allergies come from the cowshed? Allergies are often seen as an accident. Your immune system misinterprets a harmless protein like dust or peanuts as a threat, and when you encounter it, you pay the price with sneezing, wheezing, and in the worst cases, death. – by MOISES VELASQUEZ-MANOFF – http://mobile.nytimes.com/2013/11/10/opinion/sunday/a-cure-for-the-allergy-epidemic.html

: Here comes wearable computing, and Android and the Googleverse have a huge head start. But will the Android devices lose the lead because they fail to targ – Tags: Cult of Android, android, nexus, samsung, etc – http://www.cultofandroid.com/44705/will-women-dominate-the-wearable-computing-market/

Google’s Timothy Jordan: Glass is a complete break from the past: Many wonder whether Google Glass has legs as a technology. Will we still be using it (and talking about it) years from now? If you ask Google’s Senior Developer Advocate Timothy Jordan, absolutely. – by Jon Fingas – http://www.engadget.com/2013/11/09/timothy-jordan-on-google-glass/

New iWork: Another Missed Opportunity To Set Expectations: With the 5.0 iWork suite we revisit Apple’s propensity to make lofty claims that fall short of reality. The repetition of such easily avoidable mistakes is puzzling and leads us to question what causes Apple executives to squander the company’s well-deserved goodwill. – by Jean-Louis Gassée – http://www.mondaynote.com/2013/11/10/new-iwork-another-missed-opportunity-to-set-expectations/

Former director of Siri now working with Samsung on ‘internet of things’ initiative: Former Apple software engineer Luc Julia, who was in charge of developing the company’s Siri virtual assistant, is now working at Samsung on SAMI, a platform that looks to aggregate and distribute data from Internet connected devices. Samsung’s Open Innovation strategy. – by AppleInsider Staff – Tags: Apple, Apple Inc, iPhone, iPad, iPod touch, iPod nano, Apple TV, Apple, iPod shuffle, iTunes, i mac, mac os x, mac osx, Apple Computer, Apple Computer Inc., Mac OS X, iMac, iBook, Mac Pro, MacBook Pro, Magic Pad, Magic Mouse, iPod classic, App Store, iTunes Store, iBook Store, mac book, Microsoft, Adobe, Research in Motion, RIM, Nokia, Samsung, Google, Nvidia, Intel – http://appleinsider.com/articles/13/11/10/former-director-of-siri-now-working-with-samsung-on-internet-of-things-initiative

Some recent saved favorites from Pocket:

The Next BYOD: Glass In The Enterprise: While the Google Google Glass wearable computing device is still in its early stages of development, it’s only a matter of time until this next iteration of consumer-centric computing systems becomes available at reasonable prices and starts to filter into the workplace. – by EMC?Voice – http://www.forbes.com/sites/emc/2013/10/22/the-next-byod-glass-in-the-enterprise/

How Twitter’s largest outside investor tricked me: Twitter’s largest outside investor used a brilliantly simple way to avoid detection. – by Dan Primack – Tags: term sheet, twitter ipo, venture capital deals, chris sacca, j.p. morgan chase, rizvi traverse, twitter, twitter ipo, venture capital – http://finance.fortune.cnn.com/2013/11/06/twitter-investor-trick/

They Loved Your G.P.A. Then They Saw Your Tweets.: At Bowdoin College in Brunswick, Me., admissions officers are still talking about the high school senior who attended a campus information session last year for prospective students. – by NATASHA SINGER – http://mobile.nytimes.com/2013/11/10/business/they-loved-your-gpa-then-they-saw-your-tweets.html

Early Xbox One delivery reveals 500MB initial update, 17 second startup — then banned (update 3): Now that there are Xbox Ones in the wild — thanks to Target’s apparently leaky pre-order system — we’re finding out more and more about the system. – by Richard Lawler – http://www.engadget.com/2013/11/09/early-xbox-one-details/

“Because Marissa Said So” — Yahoos Bristle at Mayer’s QPR Ranking System and “Silent Layoffs”: According to a multitude of top-ranking posts on an anonymous internal message board used by Yahoo to vent their frustrations to top staff, employees there are becoming increasingly upset by an evaluation system instituted by CEO Marissa Mayer that has apparently resulted in the firings of mor – by Kara Swisher – Tags: general, media, news, featured post, marissa mayer, qpr, quarterly performance review, stack ranking, yahoo – http://allthingsd.com/20131108/because-marissa-said-so-yahoos-bristle-at-mayers-new-qpr-ranking-system-and-silent-layoffs/

Why is the first medical tricorder coming from a startup, Scanadu, and not a med-tech giant?: At the Dublin Web Summit last week, I met Sam de Brouwer, co-founder of one of the most interesting startups of the past couple of years, Scanadu. Following its successful crowdfunding campaign on Indiegogo, Scanadu’s Scout tricorder is set to go to market in March 2014. – by Martin Bryant – http://thenextweb.com/video/2013/11/09/first-medical-tricorder-come-scanadu-startup-med-tech-giant/

A Founder of Twitter Goes Long: Between downtown San Francisco and the new Twitter offices six city blocks to the west, things get sketchy. – by MATT RICHTEL – http://www.nytimes.com/2013/11/10/business/a-founder-of-twitter-goes-long.html

Google and Facebook may be our best defenders against Big Brother: Over a few weeks’ worth of bedtimes in the summer of 1984, my dad read me Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell. Though the dystopian context would have been lost on nine-year old me, the pervasive malevolence and the futility of the struggle was not. – Tags: Technology,NSA,Privacy,Google,Yahoo,Internet,Facebook,Media,Social networking,US national security,UK news,United States,World news,Technology – http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2013/nov/10/google-facebook-big-brother-reforms-data

An iPhone Tester Caught in Apple’s Supply Chain: Beneath the spotlight in a San Francisco performing arts theater, Apple (AAPL) marketing chief Phil Schiller was about to stage-manage one of the most anticipated product unveilings of the year. It was the first post-Steve Jobs reveal of a new iPhone. – by Cam Simpson – http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2013-11-07/an-iphone-tester-caught-in-apples-supply-chain

The Rise Of The Mobile-Born: Editor’s note: Paul Holland is a general partner at Foundation Capital, helping early-stage startups go from zero to $100 million in revenue. He was previously a senior vice president of worldwide sales at Kana Communications. – by Paul Holland – http://techcrunch.com/2013/11/08/the-rise-of-the-mobile-born/

‘Ferrari Of Space’ Crashing Back To Earth — Maybe Tomorrow: Sometime Sunday or early Monday, a 2,425-pound satellite that ran out of fuel last month and began falling from its already low orbit will plunge back to Earth. – by Greg Henderson – http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2013/11/09/244213231/ferrari-of-space-crashing-back-to-earth-maybe-tomorrow

Doug Rauch Wants to Sell Outdated Food at Junk-Food Prices: You’re opening a store called Daily Table early next year. It’s going to sell food that’s past its sell-by date. Can you elaborate? Yes, and food that’s cosmetically blemished or food that is excess — like fish that is perfectly wholesome, but not the fish they were going out to catch. – by HOPE REEVES – http://www.nytimes.com/2013/11/10/magazine/doug-rauch-wants-to-sell-outdated-food-at-junk-food-prices.html

A HEALING TOUCH / OPINION: This article is the third in a series of inquiries about the future of brands and haptic technologies. Read Christian Haas’ take on rewarding touchscreen interactions and Jesús Gorriti’s article about The Humble Sense. The notion of brand has evolved considerably in the last decade. – http://www.contagiousmagazine.com/2013/11/a_healing_touch.php

 

Some recent saved favorites from Pocket:

The Mobile Content Explosion: In October of 2013, Softbank Capital made a $1.5B USD investment in Supercell, the maker of two successful mobile games, giving Softbank a 51% ownership of the game maker. This investment caught the world’s attention. – by Simon Khalaf – Tags: Mobile, content, explosion, Flurry, Softbank, Supercell, app, app development, growth – http://blog.flurry.com/bid/102208/the-mobile-content-exlposion

How I Built a Performant and Measurable Content Marketing Engine: In almost every industry, startups and venture capital included, content marketing has become an essential tool for growth. – http://tomtunguz.com/content-marketing-engine/

A New Way to Look at Competitors: Every startup I see invariably puts up a competitive analysis slide that plots performance on a X/Y graph with their company in the top right. The slide is a holdover from when existing companies launched products into crowded markets. – http://steveblank.com/2013/11/08/a-new-way-to-look-at-competitors/

How Tesla Protects The Romance Of Driving While Disrupting The Industry: It’s one thing to design a car. It’s another to create the first vehicle for a brand founded on the goal of making electric cars sexy, mainstream, and a threat to the rest of the automobile industry. “No pressure,” said Franz von Holzhausen, chief designer of Tesla Motors. – http://www.fastcodesign.com/3021312/innovation-by-design/tesla-motors-chief-designer-is-protecting-the-romance-of-driving-while-

Mobile Browser Share: Android may have 80% of the smartphone market, but Android phone owners don’t seem to be doing much on them. Specifically, when it comes to mobile Web browsing, Apple’s Safari browser for the iPhone has the largest mobile browser market share by a longshot. – by Steve Kovach – Tags: Chart Of The Day, Apple, iOS, Google, Android, Safari, Steve Kovach – http://www.businessinsider.com/mobile-browser-share-2013-11

Why do people hate Henry Blodget?: When Sarah Lacy announced at one of our live events that Business Insider founder Henry Blodget would be a guest at PandoMonthly NYC, she heard actual hisses from the audience. Like the kind reserved for silent movie villains with twirled mustaches. – by David Holmes – http://pandodaily.com/2013/11/08/why-do-people-hate-henry-blodget/

Some recent saved favorites from Pocket:

It’s a Man’s Phone: The above photo is one of the many —pathetic— photos I took while struggling to document misuse of tear gas with a phone too big for my hands. All my photos from that event are obviously unusable for one simple reason: good smartphones are designed for male hands. – by Zeynep Tufekci – https://medium.com/editors-picks/a26c6bee1b69

Top Hacks from a PM Behind Two of Tech’s Hottest Products: Todd Jackson was in a small conference room with a handful of designers, engineers and Mark Zuckerberg. The topic at hand: the Facebook News Feed redesign, intended to declutter the Facebook experience and make it even more engaging. – http://firstround.com/article/Top-Hacks-from-a-PM-Behind-Two-of-Techs-Hottest-Products

WATCH: Scientists Unveil ‘Invisibility Cloak’ and Make Teddy Bear Disappear: It’s not exactly the cloak from Harry Potter, but scientists in Singapore recently unveiled a chamber of light-bending glass that promises to bring us muggles one step closer to Hogwarts territory. – by Dan Kedmey – Tags: technology, disappear, harry potter, hogwarts, invisibility cloak, light, magic, prisms, vanish – http://science.time.com/2013/11/08/watch-scientists-unveil-invisibility-cloak-and-make-a-teddy-bear-disappear/

Revolights City v2.0 Review: Revolights was kind enough to provide me with a sample of their first full production run of the Revolights City v2.0 wheel mounted LED bike lighting system, and I have been running them through the ringer over the last few months. – by Dan Saunders – http://cycletechreview.com/2013/reviews/revolights-city-v2-0-review/

Verizon Uses Phone Data to Connect Consumer Dots for NBA, Sponsors: Verizon has a location-data tracker and sponsorship-measurement tool in the pockets of millions of consumers: Verizon Wireless-enabled phones. So far it has used them to help measure the impact of its own marketing efforts, such as its sponsorship of IndyCar. – http://m.adage.com/article

Hands-on with the Xbox One: Kinect, interface, and OS impressions: Further ReadingXbox One game extravaganza: Hands-on with 10 launch exclusivesFrom Ryse to Peggle 2, Microsoft’s launch lineup is a very mixed bag. – by Kyle Orland – http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2013/11/hands-on-with-the-xbox-one-kinect-interface-and-os-impressions/

Zynga’s darkest moments: It is with some relief that once ubiquitous “games” created by social gaming giant Zynga – such as FarmVille and Mafia Wars – have faded somewhat from our national discourse. – http://www.kernelmag.com/features/report/6663/zyngas-darkest-moments/

Exclusive: Disney Reimagines Classic Star Wars Scenes in 8-Bit: Who shot first, Han or Greedo? It would probably be easier to tell for certain if everything were 8-bit. Then you’d see whose pixel bullet appeared first. – by Chris Kohler – http://www.wired.com/gamelife/2013/11/tiny-death-star/

Google barge revealed: Artistic structure with ‘fish fins’: The barge portion of the Google barge mystery is only half the story — when completed, the full package is envisioned to be an “unprecedented artistic structure,” sporting a dozen or so gigantic sails, to be moored for a month at a time at sites around the bay. – by matierandross – http://blog.sfgate.com/matierandross/2013/11/07/google-barge-revealed-artistic-structure-with-fish-fins/

A Like Is Not Enough: Facebook Tests Star Ratings Displayed On Pages: Facebook is apparently testing displaying star ratings, out of a possible five in total, on Pages on the desktop version of its site, according to a reliable tip received by TechCrunch this morning. – by Darrell Etherington – http://techcrunch.com/2013/11/07/facebook-pages-star-ratings/

Why Facebook’s New Like Button Ditches The Thumbs Up: Facebook is known for just a couple of prominent interactions that define the service. There’s the infamous poke–the strangely pseudo-sexual gesture that gives Facebook a sense of humor–and of course, its bigger, way more popular brother, the thumbs-up Like. – http://www.fastcodesign.com/3021307/innovation-by-design/why-facebooks-new-like-button-had-to-ditch-the-thumbs-up

Motorola Patent Points To Electronic Neck “Tattoos” That Double As Microphones: You’ve got to give Motorola credit these days: it’s certainly not your average smartphone player any more. – by Chris Velazco – http://techcrunch.com/2013/11/07/motorola-patent-points-to-electronic-neck-tattoos-that-double-as-microphones/

Apple’s iWatch Will Need Killer Apps: The wrist is the next frontier for technology companies. I believe this because I wear a FitBit activity tracker on my wrist; when I tap it, I am rewarded by tiny lights that blink for about two seconds, telling me how many steps I’ve walked today. – by biometrics – Tags: – http://mobile.businessweek.com/articles/2013-11-06/apples-iwatch-will-need-killer-apps

Video Games Make Your Brain Bigger, Study Says: Those addictive video games that keep players glued to the screen may actually do the brain some good — or one of them does, anyway. – http://mashable.com/2013/11/07/video-games-brain-growth/

Meet ART, Part 1: The New Super-Fast Android Runtime Google Has Been Working On In Secret For Over 2 Years Debuts In KitKat: It’s fair to say that Android went through some chaotic years in the beginning. The pace of development was frantic as the operating system grew at an unprecedented rate. – by Cody Toombs – http://www.androidpolice.com/2013/11/06/meet-art-part-1-the-new-super-fast-android-runtime-google-has-been-working-on-in-secret-for-over-2-years-debuts-in-kitkat/

Some recent saved favorites from Pocket:

Intel creates new business division for connected gadgets: SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – Intel Corp has set up a business division aimed at making money out of a new technology wave that can link up a host of electronic devices. – http://mobile.reuters.com/article/idUSBRE9A504I20131106

Google engineers over surveillance scandal: ‘Fuck you NSA’: Overnight, Two Google’s Security engineers – Mike Hearn and Brandon Downey expressed reasonable anger about the news on Google+, said “Fuck these guys”, where these represent NSA and GCHQ. – by Mohit Kumar – http://thehackernews.com/2013/11/google-engineers-over-surveillance.html

Pebble adds iOS 7 Notification Center support, partners with Foursquare and Yelp: The Pebble might be our favorite smartwatch at the moment, but it’s still a hassle to use. Setting up notifications is a pain, particularly on iOS, and there’s just not a lot the Pebble can do. Thankfully, it looks like all of that is about to change. – by Sean Hollister – http://theverge.com/2013/11/6/5072138/pebble-ios-7-notification-center-sdk-yelp-foursquare-gopro-icontrol-partnership

Minting Cash: how Square designed a product with no design at all: Is the best interface no interface? Robert Andersen was feeling flustered. Square founder Jack Dorsey had asked him to design a product that was so simple, it wouldn’t even have an interface. “Square Cash” would let people send money over email. – by Ellis Hamburger – http://www.theverge.com/2013/11/6/5072720/minting-cash-how-square-designed-square-cash

Apple Patents Bluetooth LE For Intermittent Network Sharing, Perfect For Smartwatches: The USPTO has published an Apple patent application today (via AppleInsider) that could offer a glimpse at how any potential iWatch may work, in terms of gathering data from the web. The patent describes a method for sharing a network connection over Bluetooth 4. – by Darrell Etherington – http://techcrunch.com/2013/11/07/apple-iwatch-bluetooth-le-network-patent/

Google starts testing ART, a potential replacement for Dalvik in Android — Tech News and Analysis: After a 2010 spat over how Java works in Android with Oracle, Google is moving on to a new way for apps run on mobile devices. Dubbed ART, the new runtime environment is available as a preview option in Android 4.4. – by Kevin C. Tofel – Tags: Android,Dalvik,Google,Java virtual machine,KitKat – http://gigaom.com/2013/11/06/google-starts-testing-art-a-potential-replacement-for-dalvik-in-android/

Mobile is eating the world, autumn 2013 edition — Benedict Evans: I’ve been giving versions of this deck in London and San Francisco, and I though it worth sharing here. It’s the basis of a (roughly) hour-long client presentation, with Q&A. – by Benedict Evans – http://ben-evans.com/benedictevans/2013/11/5/mobile-is-eating-the-world-autumn-2013-edition

Some recent saved favorites from Pocket …

Samsung’s Analyst Day: Custom ARM core, 560 PPI displays in 2014, and 4K phones in 2015: If it isn’t on Android Beat, it isn’t important Android news. Samsung just finished hosting their second ever analyst event in South Korea. – by Stefan Constantinescu – http://www.androidbeat.com/2013/11/samsungs-analyst-day-custom-arm-core-560-ppi-displays-2014-4k-phones-2015/

Bigger than Google Fiber: LA plans citywide gigabit for homes and businesses: Los Angeles is about to unleash one of the most ambitious city-led broadband projects to date, with the goal of bringing fiber to all of its 3.5 million residents and all businesses. – by Jon Brodkin – http://arstechnica.com/business/2013/11/bigger-than-google-fiber-la-plans-citywide-gigabit-for-homes-and-businesses/

Apple Patents Home Automation Technology That Adjusts Settings Based On Device Location: Apple has just been granted a new patent (via AppleInsider) which describes a very comprehensive system for controlling connected home devices. – by Darrell Etherington – http://techcrunch.com/2013/11/05/apple-patents-home-automation-technology/

Silicon Valley Has an Arrogance Problem: At a startup conference in the San Francisco Bay area last month, a brash and brilliant young entrepreneur named Balaji Srinivasan took the stage to lay out a case for Silicon Valley’s independence. According to Mr. – by Farhad Manjoo – http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702303661404579175712015473766

6 things wrong with the ‘Lean Startup’ model (and what to do about it): No offense to Eric Ries, who’s coined some very corporate Bingo-worthy phrases now enmeshed in Silicon Valley culture (such as pivot, minimally viable product, and continuous innovation), but there are a whole lot of things I think are wrong — dead wrong — with the entire concept. – by editor’s pick – http://venturebeat.com/2013/10/16/lean-startups-boo/#ST1gCkk7zvCmRJhu.02

Tizen is Alive and Starts Kicking!: Timing and marketing are planned in weeks where as other products take months, or years to develop. – by JohnPeter Elverding – http://www.tizenexperts.com/2013/11/tizen-alive-starts-kicking/

AOL Smacks Startup for Using CrunchBase Content It Gave Away: Can you release content under a free Creative Commons license, then change your mind and take that material back? – by David Kravets – http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2013/11/aol-crunchbase-cc-flap/

HOW TO Brine a Bird: Last updated: October 3, 2013 To print these Terms of Use, click here To email these Terms of Use, click here PLEASE READ THE TERMS AND CONDITIONS CONTAINED IN THESE “TERMS OF USE” CAREFULLY BEFORE YOU USE THIS WEBSITE, AS THEY AFFECT YOUR LEGAL RIGHTS AND OBLIGATIONS. – http://mariobatali.com/how-to-brine-a-bird/

By 4 to 1, Early Adopters Pick Wearable Watches Over Glasses: One of the most important questions about the future of computing is this: wrist or face? Google has been trumpeting its Glass devices, which can take photos and run applications like Facebook and Twitter on a small screen within eyesight. – by enewcomer – http://jessicalessin.com/2013/11/05/by-4-to-1-early-adopters-pick-wearable-watches-over-glasses/

@gordonbowman’s blog : Why Facebook Losing Teens Isn’t A Big Deal: There was a lot of noise this week about Facebook’s Q3 earnings release. First they had a beat on EPS by a wide margin. Then they also announced that mobile advertising revenue is now 49% of overall advertising revenue. – Tags: fb,earnings,$FB,mobile apps,user acquisition – http://gordonbowman.com/post/65804209766/why-facebook-losing-teens-isnt-a-big-deal#_=_

The Nexus 5 isn’t pure Android, it’s pure Google: In this, the fifth year of Android’s existence, we also have seen the release of the fifth Nexus phone — appropriately enough called the Nexus 5. Meanwhile, it’s been two years since we saw the release of Android 4. – by Dieter Bohn – http://www.theverge.com/2013/11/5/5069310/the-nexus-5-isnt-pure-android-its-pure-google

Consolidate this: Quantified self edition: My friend, Kevin Kelly, coined the term quantified self in October of 2007 with this blog post. In the in six years since, the fruits of such self quantification can now be found on the TV, the radio, and all over the internet. – by Nova Spivack – Tags: Bottlenose,internet of things,Memoto,narrative,Nova Spivack,quantified-self,Saga – http://gigaom.com/2013/10/13/consolidate-this-quantified-self-edition/

South Korea is stuck with Internet Explorer for online shopping because of security law: SEOUL — South Korea is renowned for its digital innovation, with coast-to-coast broadband and a 4G LTE network that reaches into Seoul’s subway system. But this tech-savvy country is stuck in a time warp in one way: its slavish dependence on Internet Explorer. – by Chico Harlan – Tags: south korea,south korea internet,south korea technology,internet explorer,chrome,google,microsoft,south korea 4g – http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia_pacific/due-to-security-law-south-korea-is-stuck-with-internet-explorer-for-online-shopping/2013/11/03/ffd2528a-3eff-11e3-b028-de922d7a3f47_story.html

What’s Your ‘Fitness Age’?: This article appears in the Nov. 3, 2013 issue of The New York Times Magazine. Trying to quantify your aerobic fitness is a daunting task. It usually requires access to an exercise-physiology lab. – by GRETCHEN REYNOLDS – http://mobile.nytimes.com/blogs/well/2013/10/31/how-old-is-your-health/

Twitter Is Weird—and Other Things Fatherhood Taught Me: It was about 11 am on August 29 when, as always happens in the movies but rarely happens in real life, my wife’s water broke, and she went into labor.  Then it was today, November 1, and I returned to work. – by Alexis C. Madrigal – Tags: The Atlantic, The Atlantic Magazine, TheAtlantic.com, Atlantic, news, opinion, breaking news, analysis, commentary, business, politics, culture, international, science, technology, national and life – http://m.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2013/11/twitter-is-weird-and-other-things-fatherhood-taught-me/281082/

To live and die in public: That’s Twitter: My affair with Twitter, the idea, began over seven years ago. It was at a party, a few blocks from where I live and work — San Francisco’s South of Market neighborhood. I was hanging outside, sucking on a stogie, and chatting with Twitter’s forgotten co-creator, Noah Glass. – by Om Malik – Tags: Ali Rowghani,Biz Stone,Derek Jeter,Dick Costolo,Emily Chang,Evan Williams,Hank Moody,Jack Dorsey,Larry Page,Mark Zuckerberg,Max Levchin,Nick Bilton,Noah Glass,Om Says,Sergey Brin – http://gigaom.com/2013/11/04/to-live-and-die-in-public-thats-twitter/

Some recent saved favorites from Pocket:

10 ways to develop a mobile roadmap: Just 12 to 18 months ago, many organizations looked at their mobile initiatives very narrowly. Some wanted to create a very specific mobile application in one part of their business, while others sought guidance on mobility governance and policy. – by John Koetsier – http://venturebeat.com/2013/11/03/10-ways-to-develop-a-mobile-roadmap/

The Future of Bomb Sniffing Is in Shit: An EU-funded project is developing a network of sensors that could sniff out bomb-makers from the substances they flush into sewers. The idea is to catch people who are cooking up their own IEDs before they’re able to use them. – by Victoria Turk – http://motherboard.vice.com/blog/the-future-of-sniffing-out-bombs-is-in-the-sewers

Android 4.4 KitKat, the browser and the Chrome WebView: Android 4.4 has made a big change in the OS’ internals for HTML5 development: it has replaced its original WebKit-based WebView with modern Chromium. The new Android Browser is also powered by Chromium but it’s not clear yet its future. – Tags: android,chrome,html5,phonegap,webview – http://www.mobilexweb.com/blog/android-4-4-kitkat-browser-chrome-webview

How Mobile is Disrupting Even the Most Successful Internet Products: In 2008, iGoogle represented 20% of traffic to Google. Seven years later, the mobile phone is the home screen of choice for a billion people. iGoogle is dead. Mobile killed it. The typical mobile phone user checks their phone 110 times per day. – http://tomtunguz.com/mobile-frequency-of-use/

PayPal who? Dwolla is the most daring digital payment startup you’ve never heard of: When it comes to radically altering the fabric of digital payments, there is no startup more interesting than Dwolla. – by Ben Popper – http://www.theverge.com/2013/11/4/5055620/dwolla-digital-payment-startup

The Magical iPad: This is part three in a series on last week’s iPad event. Part 1: Whither Liberal Arts? | Part 2: The Missing “Why” of the iPad | Part 3: The Magical iPad Yesterday’s presentation covered the “What” and “How” of the iPad, but it had nothing about “Why. – by apps – http://stratechery.com/2013/magical-ipad/

We play with the Steam Machine, Valve’s game console of the future: Can the company behind ‘Half-Life’ build hardware worthy of the TV? Valve Corporation, the video game developer responsible for Half-Life, Portal, Team Fortress , and the digital distribution platform Steam, has an ambitious plan to reinvent the video game console. – by Sean Hollister – http://www.theverge.com/2013/11/4/5063760/we-try-the-steam-machine-valves-video-game-console-of-the-future

Two Next-Level Wearables That Aren’t for Everyone: Many people are waiting for expected upcoming smartwatches from Apple and Google to take the wearable category to the next level. Or at least as much of a next-level as you can expect from a first-generation product. – by Liz Gannes – Tags: mobile, news, product news, bodybuilding, fashion, indigogo, kickstarter, memi, pebble, push, wearables – http://allthingsd.com/20131102/two-next-level-wearables-that-arent-for-everyone/

Intel Is Under New Management – And It Shows: Intel rode the PC wave with Microsoft and built an seemingly insurmountable lead in the field of “conventional” (PCs and laptops) microprocessors. – by Jean-Louis Gassée – http://www.mondaynote.com/2013/11/04/intel-is-under-new-management-and-it-shows/

How Google Is Planning To Make Android Gingerbread Toast – ReadWrite: The scourge of Android is a Gingerbread man—and Google is finally ready to kill it. – http://readwrite.com/2013/10/31/google-project-svelte-android-fragmentation-kitkat-gingerbread

Get ready for in-store advertising that looks you straight in the eye: The next time you’re waiting to pay at Tesco, the ads you’re watching may be watching you back. – by Siraj Datoo – http://qz.com/143180/get-ready-for-in-store-advertising-that-looks-you-straight-in-the-eye/

Some recent saved favorites from Pocket:

How Googley is Nexus 5 Exactly?: This isn’t a review of the Nexux 5. Rather, it’s a review of Google’s new strategy of integration as displayed in the KitKat-running Nexus 5. You’ll – by Mike Elgan – Tags: Cult of Android, android, nexus, samsung, etc – http://www.cultofandroid.com/44248/how-googley-is-nexus-5-exactly/

Earth’s Giant Ear Marks 50 Years of Listening for Signals From the Cosmos: The Arecibo Observatory’s radio telescope is the largest single dish in the world. Here, the platform above the dish is illuminated by the afternoon light. (Nadia Drake/WIRED) An early artist’s conception of the telescope. The shape of the dish is the same, but the tower system changed. – by Nadia Drake – http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2013/11/arecibo-50th-anniversary/

The Billion Dollar Valuation Club: Aileen Lee has a really good post up on TechCrunch, in which she analyzes the number of companies that have been started since 2003 that have gone on to be worth $1bn or more. – http://www.avc.com/a_vc/2013/11/the-billion-dollar-valuation-club.html

Disney and Dish Wrangle Not Over Broadcast Fees, but the Future of TV: What is taking so long? Not any disagreement about the billions of dollars that Dish will pay Disney for its programming over the life of the next contract. The two sides agreed about the money a while ago. – by BRIAN STELTER – http://www.nytimes.com/2013/11/04/business/media/disney-and-dish-wrangle-not-over-broadcast-fees-but-the-future-of-tv.html

Man, 80, fights bear, falls off cliff – and survives: An octogenarian versus a hungry Russian bear. It was a confrontation that could have ended only one way, and yet shepherd Yusuf Alchagirov was sitting upright in bed this week and happily munching on the three traditional pies his family had baked in celebration at his survival. – Tags: Russia,Animals,Europe,World news,World news – http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/oct/31/man-80-fights-bear-survives

Some recent saved favorites from Pocket:

Daylight Saving Time Is Terrible: Here’s a Simple Plan to Fix It: Losing another hour of evening daylight isn’t just annoying. It’s an economically harmful policy with minimal energy savings. Daylight saving time ends Nov. – by Allison Schrager – Tags: The Atlantic, The Atlantic Magazine, TheAtlantic.com, Atlantic, news, opinion, analysis, commentary, Business, Wall Street, Megan McArdle – http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2013/11/daylight-saving-time-is-terrible-heres-a-simple-plan-to-fix-it/281075/

Welcome To The Unicorn Club: Learning From Billion-Dollar Startups: Editor’s note: Aileen Lee is founder of Cowboy Ventures, a seed-stage fund that backs entrepreneurs reinventing work and personal life through software. Previously, she joined Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers in 1999 and was also founding CEO of digital media company RMG Networks, backed by KPCB. – by Aileen Lee – http://techcrunch.com/2013/11/02/welcome-to-the-unicorn-club/

Why Taking Money From Influential Investors Can Backfire: DAVID COHEN: When seeking out investors, what matters most is how engaged, helpful and committed you think they’ll be. – http://blogs.wsj.com/accelerators/2013/11/01/weekend-read-why-taking-money-from-influential-investors-can-backfire/

2014 Will Be The Year Of Wearable Technology: Looking over the mobile stands and start-ups at ‘The Summit‘ this week in Dublin, it’s clear that the next wave of hardware innovation in mobile is going to come from the rise of wearable technology. – by Ewan Spence – http://www.forbes.com/sites/ewanspence/2013/11/02/2014-will-be-the-year-of-wearable-technology/

Wrangling Data From a Huge Variety of Fitness Gadgets: The human body is in data overload. – by ERIC A. TAUB – http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/31/technology/personaltech/wrangling-data-from-a-huge-variety-of-fitness-apps-and-devices.html

Riding the Hashtag in Social Media Marketing: About once a week, Gary Vaynerchuk posts a Twitter message that reads, “Is there anything I can do for you?” He means it literally. He is inviting his roughly one million followers to send requests for any kind of help or favor. And if you respond, he will try to punch you in the face. – by DAVID SEGAL – http://mobile.nytimes.com/2013/11/03/technology/riding-the-hashtag-in-social-media-marketing.html

Netflix starts testing 4K videos, wants to launch Ultra HD next year : Netflix quietly added a handful of 4K HD videos to its catalog this week to prepare itself for a wider launch of ultra high-definition video content in the coming months. – by Janko Roettgers – Tags: 4k,4K resolution,Reed HAstings,Ultra HD – http://gigaom.com/2013/11/01/netflix-starts-testing-4k-videos-wants-to-launch-ultra-hd-next-year/

Jelly Bean now on more than half of active Android devices: We’ve got a new version of Android now available — and a new round of platform version numbers to go along with it. As you’d expect, there are no Android 4.4 KitKat numbers for the week leading into Nov. 1 — and remember that Android 4. – by Phil Nickinson – Tags: android,versions,News – http://www.androidcentral.com/jelly-bean-now-more-half-active-android-devices

Some recent saved favorites from Pocket:

Google Play now drives 25% more downloads than iOS app store, has 50% the revenue: Google Play is continuing its inexorable overtaking of the App Store, with downloads now 25 percent higher, and app revenue that is slowly overtaking Apple’s sales. The reason is exactly the same one that impacts iOS market share: international markets. – by John Koetsier – http://venturebeat.com/2013/10/31/google-play-now-drives-25-more-downloads-than-ios-app-store-has-50-the-revenue/

Reading J.J. Abrams’ Novel S. Is Like Downloading Lost to Your Brain: Let’s get the tl;dr version out of the way first: If you were a fan of Lost — and especially the speculation and theorizing that surrounded the show itself — then S., the novel/meta-narrative by J.J. Abrams and Doug Dorst, is pretty much written for you. – by Graeme McMillan – http://www.wired.com/underwire/2013/11/j-j-abrams-s-book-review/

The DIY Cyborg: Humanity just made a large, DIY step towards a time when everyone can upgrade themselves towards being a cyborg. Of all places, it happened somewhere in the post-industrial tristesse of the German town of Essen. – by Max Hoppenstedt – http://motherboard.vice.com/blog/the-diy-cyborg

17 Responses to “Confirmed: Apple & Best Buy will price match Walmart’s $479 iPad Air deal in stores (Staples too)”: As it has been known to do for recent Apple product launches, Walmart announced last week that it would be offering a $20 discount on Apple’s new entry-level 16GB iPad Air starting as soon as the device launches tomorrow on November 1. – by Jordan Kahn – http://9to5mac.com/2013/11/01/confirmed-apple-best-buy-will-price-match-walmarts-479-ipad-air-deal-in-stores/

How Mountain Biking Explains The Painful Exhilaration Of Launching A Startup: Falling hurts–so does failing–but it’s part of the journey. So you’re teetering on the edge of starting your own business and you’re looking for advice. Here is mine: Go get yourself a mountain bike. – by David Rose – http://m.fastcompany.com/3020961/how-mountain-biking-explains-the-painful-exhilaration-of-launching-a-startup

A Stunning Elevated Biking Track Keeps Cyclists Far Away From Careening Cars: In most cities, cycling infrastructure isn’t much more than a few dotted lines on the road. But that’s not how it is in the Netherlands, one of the world’s most cycle-friendly nations. – http://m.fastcoexist.com/3020915/a-stunning-elevated-biking-track-keeps-cyclists-far-away-from-careening-cars

T-Mobile’s Wacky Plan to Trash the Wireless Business Model: John Legere smiled, the kind of smile reserved for a man who knows he has already won and is just waiting to announce it. – by Brendan Greeley – http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2013-10-31/t-mobiles-john-legere-trashes-the-wireless-business-model#r=rss

Fab’s Chief Design Officer Bradford Shellhammer Leaves The Company: The cofounder of the e-commerce company, valued at $1 billion, is stepping away from his day-to-day role; Jason Goldberg will stay on as CEO. Fab cofounder and chief design officer Bradford Shellhammer has announced he is stepping away from his day-to-day role at the e-commerce company. – http://www.fastcompany.com/3021037/fast-feed/fab-cofounder-chief-design-officer-bradford-shellhammer-leaves-company#mydailysocial

Broken news: struggling to find facts in the Twitter maelstrom: As with Hurricane Sandy, the Boston Marathon bombings, and countless other major stories, news of today’s shooting at the Los Angeles International Airport was sometimes muddled with misinformation. – by Adi Robertson – http://www.theverge.com/2013/11/1/5056344/broken-news-struggling-to-find-facts-in-twitter-maelstrom

Google just pulled a “Facebook Home”: KitKat’s primary interface is Google Search: One of the headline features of Android 4.4 is a revamped home screen and app launcher. The icons are bigger, there is more transparency, and the app drawer makes better use of the screen real estate. – by Ron Amadeo – http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2013/11/google-just-pulled-a-facebook-home-kitkats-primary-interface-is-google-search/

The ‘father of the iPod’ explains how his company Nest is using tech to make your home ‘conscious’: What’s the very first thing you do when you meet one of the ‘fathers of the iPod‘?  Complain about central heating, that’s right. – by Ben Woods – http://thenextweb.com/insider/2013/11/01/tony-fadell-father-ipod-working-original-mac-team-apple-led-reinvention-unloved-household-products/

Video: Helmet-cam cyclist busts driver eating cereal at 30mph: Police are investigating after a helmet cam-equipped cyclist spotted a driver in Edinburgh eating a bowl of cereal, complete with milk, while driving at over 30mph. YouTube user Raging Bike posted the footage after a ‘WTF’ moment as the driver passed him on a busy Edinburgh street. – by John Stevenson – Tags: Cycling, cycle, bike, bicycle, biking, road, leisure, commute, race, cycle clothing, cycle gear, cycle components, reviews, bike reviews, news, video, forums, chat, riding – http://road.cc/content/news/98225-video-helmet-cam-cyclist-busts-driver-eating-cereal-30mph

Some recent saved favorites from Pocket:

Google Now and speech recognition get big updates in Android 4.4 KitKat: Over the past year and a half Google’s steadily added new features and cards to its predictive search assistant, Google Now. With Android 4. – by Dante D’Orazio – http://www.theverge.com/2013/10/31/5051458/android-kit-kat-bring-big-updates-to-google-now-and-speech-recognition

Google’s Nexus 5 with KitKat available today, starting at $349: hands-on impressions: Google’s Nexus program has a simple goal: make the best, purest, most perfect Android phone. And, beginning with last year’s Nexus 4, Google did all that at a remarkable price, charging with no strings attached what most carriers and manufacturers would charge with a two-year contract. – by Dieter Bohn – http://www.theverge.com/2013/10/31/5049068/googles-nexus-5-with-android-kit-kat-available-today-starting-349/in/4815723

Be like Gillette: Why software is the razor blade of hardware companies: The most successful hardware companies are the ones that look a lot like Gillette. Consider Dropcam, for example. – by Devindra Hardawar – http://venturebeat.com/2013/10/31/be-like-gillette-why-software-is-the-razor-blade-of-hardware-companies/

Twitter Introduces Fine-Tuning Options To MagicRecs Recommendations Via DM: Twitter did an interesting thing this morning with its @magicrecs recommendation service. It introduced a text-based menu system that you access via DM, which lets you tune the recommendations that you get via push notification or message. – by Matthew Panzarino – http://techcrunch.com/2013/10/31/twitter-introduces-fine-tuning-options-to-magicrecs-recommendations-via-dm/

Networked Intelligent Bicycles Are Transforming Urban Riding – ReadWrite: The world’s first open source piece of hardware was the bicycle, according to the Open Source Hardware Association. To be more precise, it was the draisine, introduced as a two-wheeled human-propelled walking machine in 1817. – http://readwrite.com/2013/10/31/bicycles-intelligent-network

Coast Guard visits mysterious ‘Google barge’: Natalie DiBlasio hosts NewsBreak covering the ‘Google Barge’ mystery. SAN FRANCISCO — The Coast Guard on Wednesday visited the mysterious “Google barge” floating in San Francisco Bay, but the agency would not reveal anything about the tech giant’s hush-hush vessel. – by Michael Winter, USA TODAY – http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/10/30/coast-guard-visits-mysterious-google-barge/3318347/

Google Fiber app gains new DVR features, now on iPhone and iPod Touch: For the lucky few who’ve signed on to Google’s Fiber TV service, you’re about to get a few more goodies coming your way. – by Nicole Lee – http://www.engadget.com/2013/10/30/google-fiber-app-dvr-iphone-ipod/

Hyperloop Startup Lands Major Partners and Unveils Official Name: The idea for the hyperloop has been floating around since 2012, back when Telsa and SpaceX founder Elon Musk first came up with the next-gen transportation concept. – by Adario Strange – http://mashable.com/2013/10/31/hyperloop-startup-lands-major-partners-and-unveils-official-name/

Some recent saved favorites from Pocket:

Developing robots that collaborate with people: The National Science Foundation (NSF), in partnership with NIH, USDA and NASA, has announced about $38 million in investment for developing robots that cooperatively work with people to enhance individual human capabilities, performance and safety. – http://www.kurzweilai.net/developing-robots-that-collaborate-with-people

Top Reviewers On Amazon Get Tons Of Free Stuff: The original version of this story displayed an image that included information from a newsletter sent by Amazon to frequent reviewers. It was not made clear to the person who provided the newsletter to NPR that the information would be published as part of the story. – by Lisa Chow – http://www.npr.org/blogs/money/2013/10/29/241372607/top-reviewers-on-amazon-get-tons-of-free-stuff

DARPA wants drones to have lasers too: Laser pods mounted on drones to shoot down missiles. Yeah, that’s science fiction warfare, right there. And that’s exactly what the US military wants. – by Casey Chan – http://sploid.gizmodo.com/darpa-wants-drones-to-have-lasers-too-1455685748/@caseychan

The iPad Air: There are so many millions of iPad users that no simple explanation can cover all use cases. But my take, since last year, has been that the full-size iPad is best seen as an alternative to a laptop, and the iPad Mini as a supplement to a laptop. – by John Gruber – http://daringfireball.net/2013/10/the_ipad_air

Video: David Bowie: : Combining headlong distortion with radically honest lyrics, Perfect Pussy are one of the year’s boldest new rock bands. – http://m.pitchfork.com/news/52835-video-david-bowie-love-is-lost-remixed-by-james-murphy/

The Quest to Build a Truly Free Version of Android: You’ve probably heard Android is free and open source. But that’s not entirely true. Although most of the code in the Android Open Source Project is indeed open source, much of the software that interacts with hardware components like GPS chips, cameras and graphics is proprietary. – by Klint Finley – http://www.wired.com/wiredenterprise/2013/10/replicant/

MIT Wristband Could Make AC Obsolete: Here’s a scary statistic: In 2007, 87 percent of households in the U.S. used air conditioning, compared to just 11 percent of households in Brazil and a mere 2 percent in India. – by Kyle VanHemert – http://www.wired.com/design/2013/10/an-ingenious-wristband-that-keeps-your-body-at-the-perfect-temperature-no-ac-required/

Android’s Next Targets: Wearables, TVs, Low-End Phones: The launch of Google Inc.’s Android KitKat, the next version of the most widely used operating software for smartphones and tablets, is drawing near. Google executives haven’t announced a release date but people who have been briefed on KitKat say that it is coming soon. – by Amir Efrati – http://jessicalessin.com/2013/10/31/androids-next-targets-wearables-tvs-low-end-phones/

Bitcoin Pursues the Mainstream: The currency known as bitcoin — a much-hyped and much-doubted type of digital cash that can be bought with traditional money — has mostly attracted attention for its popularity in the black market, and for its wildly gyrating valuation. – by Nick Wingfield – http://mobile.nytimes.com/2013/10/31/technology/bitcoin-pursues-the-mainstream.html

Stand Clear of Closing Doors! Protect Your Manicure: REMEMBER the vending machines in New York City subway stations, even on platforms? (O.K., maybe not, as it was decades ago.) Among the products straphangers could buy were cigarettes, candy and gum; there were also scales proclaiming, “Horoscope and weight 1¢.” – by STUART ELLIOTT – http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/30/business/media/stand-clear-of-closing-doors-protect-your-manicure.html

Netflix’s next big battle: in-season binge-watching: Netflix, the undisputed king of full-season TV binge-viewing, is now preparing for battle with networks, along with cable and satellite providers, on a new front: in-season binge-watching. – by Search results – http://qz.com/141047

Apple should be like Bloomberg: I’m very glad that the WSJ has published today’s debate between Farhad Manjoo and Dennis Berman on the subject of Apple. – by Felix Salmon – Tags: stocks,technology – http://blogs.reuters.com/felix-salmon/2013/10/29/apple-should-be-like-bloomberg/

Hello, ladies: Bonobos finally launches a women’s line: Bonobos co-founder and CEO Andy Dunn may be building an ecommerce company, but his role model isn’t fulfillment-obsessed Jeff Bezos. It’s the man most people call the greatest merchant of our time: Mickey Drexler. – by Sarah Lacy – http://pandodaily.com/2013/10/30/hello-ladies-bonobos-finally-launches-a-womens-line/

Spotify-like Solayo plays music and videos from YouTube, Dailymotion and SoundCloud in one place: Want to stream music or videos for free right within your browser without having to open multiple tabs? In comes Solayo, a Web app that aggregates content from YouTube, Dailymotion and SoundCloud, letting you search for and play music and videos from just a single site. – by Kaylene Hong – http://thenextweb.com/media/2013/10/30/spotify-like-solayo-plays-music-and-videos-from-youtube-dailymotion-and-soundcloud-in-one-place/