Categories
-Context 1.3 Computers Today: A Brief Taxonomy 4.4 The User Interface: The Human-Machine Connection

Apple and Technology Intimacy

Apple and IntimacyAs one of the most innovative and profitable companies on the planet, Apple makes headlines when it makes announcements. This week Apple announced several important new products, each of which represents trends in a fast changing industry. Larger iPhones bridge the gap between smart phones and tablets. A mobile payments system designed to bypasses credit cards and protect privacy and security of users. And Apple’s long-awaited entry into the wearable computer market that has humbled several other companies. Technology writer Steven Levy’s thought-provoking piece for Medium suggests that the Apple watch may signal the beginning of a new, much more intimate type of interface between humans and their digital devices.

Categories
-Context 10.3 Security, Privacy, Freedom, and Ethics 10.5 Human Questions for a Computer Age 4.6 Software Piracy and Intellectual Property Laws

Are Our Intellectual Property Laws Patently Absurd?

patentspart2Patents have been part of American life since the country was born—they were written into the constitution to legally protect and encourage innovation, creativity, and productivity. But today, patents are used by shadowy companies that make nothing more than profits—and the threat of lawsuits from these companies is enough to keep people from creating high-tech products, companies, and jobs. This episode of This American Life shines a bright light on the broken intellectual property legal system by telling the stories of people whose lives have been profoundly impacted by that system.
thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/496/when-patents-attack-part-two

Categories
-Context 4.4 The User Interface: The Human-Machine Connection 8.4 The Network Advantage 9.2 Inside the Web Chapter 1 Exploring Our Digital Planet

Five Minutes, Ten Tips. How Many Hours Will You Save?

David-Pogue-TEDDavid Pogue is one of the most prolific–and entertaining–tech writers we know. In this short TED talk, he runs through a list of tips that can save you time every day. Don’t miss it.

Categories
-Updates 1.0 Creating Communities on the Living Web 13.3 E-Business 2.0: Reinventing Web Commerce 4.3 System Software: The Hardware-Software Connection 4.4 The User Interface: The Human-Machine Connection 8.7 Social Networks

Android Phones Show a New Face(book)

Rumors of a Facebook phone have rattled around the tech world for quite a while. Today Facebook announced not a a phone, but software that can convert many Android phones into Facebook machines. Facebook is available in app form on most smart phones. But the new Facebook Home software will replace the Android home screen with a Facebook-centered home, making it possible for social networkers to keep Facebook at the center of their phone experiences. Will Android phone users click Like?
http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2013/04/facebook-android-home-phone/?cid=6882274

Categories
-Inventing the Future 4.4 The User Interface: The Human-Machine Connection 4.7 Inventing the Future: Tomorrow's User Interfaces I

Is That a New Tattoo or a New Computer?

The smart phone in your pocket is a computer that’s much more powerful and easy to use than the mainframes of yesterday. But if this research project pans out, that phone may eventually be a replaced by a small patch on the back of your hand.
fastcodesign.com/1672217/stamp-on-circuits-could-put-your-phone-on-your-finger

Categories
-Inventing the Future 10.5 Human Questions for a Computer Age 11.1 Where Computers Work 3.2 Output: From Pulses to People 4.6 Software Piracy and Intellectual Property Laws

3-D Printing Applications and Implications

We’ve heard about how 3D printers can be used to manufacture toys, small machine parts, and even some prosthetic devices for human bodies. But as applications emerge, so do some difficult questions.

  • According to this Wired story, a printed car might soon share the road with you. But for legal reasons, it might technically be a motorcycle.
  • This NPR story explores some of the intellectual property questions raised by 3-D printers.
  • It’s one thing to print a figurine of a copyrighted comic book character; printing a lethal weapon is something else altogether.
    This NPR story explains how 3-D printers muddy the waters in the debate over gun safety.
Categories
-Inventing the Future 4.4 The User Interface: The Human-Machine Connection 4.7 Inventing the Future: Tomorrow's User Interfaces I 5.8 Inventing the Future: Multisensory Interfaces

Will You Be Waving Goodbye to Your Touch Screen Soon?

Just as the mouse made the command-line interface of early PCs seem primitive, the touch screen may soon put the mouse out of a job. But after you see this short video, you may think that even the touch screen is old-fashioned. Once again, science fiction points the way to future technology.
wired.com/gadgetlab/2013/01/leap-motion-asus
 

Categories
-Updates 1.3 Computers Today: A Brief Taxonomy 3.1 Input: From Person to Processor 4.4 The User Interface: The Human-Machine Connection

The Changing World of Windows

Microsoft will soon offer two new versions of its ubiquitous Windows operating system. Windows 8 is designed to replace Windows 7 as the flagship PC OS. Windows RT will run mostly on Microsoft’s new Surface and other tablet devices. This CNET article gives an overview of the two OSs and how they fit into a world where the line between tablets and laptops is blurred by all kinds of hybrid devices.
reviews.cnet.com/8301-33642_7-57536310-292/windows-8-buying-guide/

Categories
-Context 10.3 Security, Privacy, Freedom, and Ethics 4.6 Software Piracy and Intellectual Property Laws 6.4 Multimedia Authoring: Making Mixed Media

Remix this Post!

Was Bob Dylan a creative genius or a thief? What about Steve Jobs? Or that kid down the block who posts cut-and-paste videos on YouTube? In this entertaining short TED talk, Kirby Ferguson argues that every creation is, to some degree, a remix. Do our intellectual property laws need to change to embrace, rather than outlaw, remixes?
ted.com/talks/kirby_ferguson_embrace_the_remix.html

Categories
-Inventing the Future 11.7 The High-Tech Home 15.6 The Robot Revolution 4.4 The User Interface: The Human-Machine Connection

The Robot in Your Future Home

Personal robots are coming. This fascinating NPR story gives an audio peek inside the labs that are working hard to bring robots to everyday people.
wbur.org/npr/155278207/you-know-you-want-one-personal-robots-not-ready-for-you-yet