Archive

Cooking Apps: Now You’re Cooking with Tech
Drop that marinara-stained card with grandma’s “special” sauce recipe on it. The days of shelves lined with cookbooks and recipe boxes is over and cooking apps are here. One trip to the Apple’s App Store will push your food prep into the future, thanks to all of the interesting ways you can utilize your iPhone or iPad to become a top notch chef. Here are ten of our favorite apps for help spicing up your next kitchen experiment. 1. Foodgawker (Free) - They say you eat with your eyes before... Read more...
Ringtone Your Own Way: Personalizing Your Ringtone
Short of carving your initials into the screen with a pocketknife, sometimes it’s tough to make your phone stand out from all of the other sleek glass and metal handsets out there.  One easy way to add a little extra personality to your iPhone or Android device is to switch up the ringtone to something that truly represents you. Sure, it’ll be that much easier to pinpoint the guilty party if it goes off in the middle of an important meeting, but with great risk comes great reward! By taking... Read more...
Apple TV Upgraded: The New Apple TV
Don’t forget, Apple makes more than the iPad. They also make a tiny black box that they call  “ Apple TV,” and it just got updated. When Apple upgraded their new iPads from A5 processors to the A5X, they must’ve had some back stock of those older iPad 2 chips left over. Look for the A5 to add some speed to the 2012 edition of Apple’s pet set-top box project, Apple TV. The latest incarnation looks exactly like its 2010 predecessor, but it’s such small unit that you’ll probably leave... Read more...
iPad: The Third Generation
Perhaps the biggest surprise about the iPad 3 is it’s name, which isn’t actually iPad 3. It’s just “iPad.” So what gives? This past Wednesday, Apple CEO Tim Cook revealed all there is to know about the new device. The latest in the iPad line, Apple’s third-generation tablet will shirk the simple, iterative naming scheme that has worked so well for the iPhone and iPad until now, leaving the curiously named iPad 2 as the odd device out. While most of us tech-speculators had a majority of the details about... Read more...
iPad Game On! Ghost Trick: Phantom Detective
When your character comes to at the beginning of Capcom’s latest iPad adventure game, Ghost Trick: Phantom Detective, he has a lot of questions. Who am I? Why am I here? What’s up with my wacky hairstyle? Freshly dead and floating above your own limp body, your spirit is less restless and more confused. Next to you, a shady looking hit-man holds a beautiful young redhead at gun-point. But who are they? You don’t know much, but you know that you have to do something to save this woman, before... Read more...
Nokia Pushes the Limits of Smartphone Camera Tech
How many megapixels are too many to fit into your pants pocket? The correct answer, of course, is “there’s no such thing as too many megapixels!” To prove this point, Finnish phone-maker Nokia has announced that their newest smartphone, the 808 PureView, will contain a comically-high definition 41 megapixel censor. In addition to high-performance, on-board optics co-developed with famous lens-makers Carl Zeiss, the maddeningly high number of megapixels will allow 7 pixels worth of data to be captured and synthesized for every single viewable pixel, resulting in images that Nokia... Read more...
It’s Official: A New iPad is Coming
On Tuesday, Apple mailed out the invites for their next big event. At 10AM PST, on Wednesday, March 7th, at San Francisco’s Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, Apple will make an announcement that is sure to change the tablet computing landscape. Based on the invitation, it seems apparent that the heir to the iPad throne is about to be revealed. While it would be easy to guess that this device will be called the “iPad 3,” Apple has long been known for marching to the beat of their own... Read more...
Please Turn on Your iPhone (iPad or Laptop) for the Movie
Watching Movies on Your iPhone, iPad or Laptop If you have an iPhone, iPad or laptop, watching movies has never been easier. Forget the whole process of going to the video store. Do they still have those, anyway? Sure, there’s the RedBox, but who wants to drive back to return the film? Netflix is great, but having to wait days in between videos can be frustrating. These iPhone apps, iPad apps and websites will help you get caught up on new movies before the Academy Awards on Monday – even... Read more...
Android, iPhone, and iPad Mobile Apps for Concert Going
For all of the great solutions for managing your personal music collection and discovering new musicians from around the globe, there’s still no way to truly bring the full experience of a live concert into your living room. Sure, recordings are nice, but even the highest quality MP3s can’t re-create the hair-raising, ear-popping experience of seeing your favorite band light up the stage, live. But before you run off to Red Rocks or the House of Blues, arm yourself with our favorite mobile apps for making the most of any... Read more...
iPhone and iPad Apps for the Academy Awards
The Oscars are almost here! Will you be battling your friends in an Oscar betting pool, or just sitting back to watch the show with some movie-themed snacks? However you plan to spend your Sunday night, these free iPhone and iPad apps will help maximize your Academy Awards experience. 1. Awards Hero: Oscars Edition Do you have what it takes to build the best Oscar ballot? Get access to all the info you need about this year’s nominees and then show off your skills by predicting the winners. Once you’re... Read more...
Update Your Mobile Technology: Smartphones and Computers
Without an iPad, an iPhone, or even a sufficiently smart phone, I was getting left behind. Literally. While stopping for coffee, I realized I still hadn’t bought tickets for Star Wars: Episode I in 3D. After booting up my clunky laptop, the Starbucks’ “Terms & Agreements” blocked my way to the Internet. While the progress bar hiccuped, I noticed a man in line using the Fandango App on his iPhone. A couple taps on his screen and… “Congratulations! You’ve purchased tickets to Star Wars: Episode I in 3D!” He called his... Read more...
Chrome Away from Home: New Android Browser
 A beta version of Google’s popular Chrome web browser is finally available for Android-powered phones and tablets. However, before you rush on over to the Android Marketplace, there’s something you should know. This new mobile Chrome is great, but you probably can’t use it yet. According to the official Android Developers resource, only 1% of all Android devices are currently running the newest version of that operating system, Ice Cream Sandwich, which is required to download Chrome. If your pocket currently contains a shiny new Samsung Galaxy Nexus phone, or... Read more...
Burning Man, Technology & Time: A Sociological Look at Scheduling
(Photograph Courtesy of Michael Holden) You may imagine that people who make the annual desert pilgrimage to Burning Man do so to escape their schedules and technology.  That there, hundreds of miles from a dot on the map, in dust so alkaline it will eat your iPhone, people must put aside devices of connectivity; they must rediscover other ways of connecting.  The reality is far more paradoxical.  Burning Man is simultaneously the last vestige of an unplugged tribal culture and a frontier-edge of adoption.  This year, the introduction of several... Read more...
An Emergent Syntax of Stuff
(Photo Courtesy of Dave Patten) In the 2006 comedy Idiocracy, Mike Judge depicts the Great Garbage Avalanche of 2505. That falling mass is almost certainly full of original iPads, first generation iPods, and antiquated iPhones, along with device-specific chargers and trashed FM transmitters. Technological advances have their costs. More pernicious than the stylized movie threats of new weapons or rampaging dinosaur clones, we face a not-so-subtle and advancing threat: the exponential growth of stuff. This is the environmental impact of planned obsolescence, or the design practice of deliberately providing a product with a limited useful... Read more...
Distributed Intelligence & Octopus Smarts
(Photograph Courtesy of Sarah Faulwetter) "To understand ourselves, we must embrace the alien." -  PZ Meyers, octopus neuroscientist   As discussed in Biomimicry and the Design Revolution, our species is learning to consult the natural world for evolved solutions to contemporary human problems.  This paradigm shift – commonly referred to as “biomimicry” – has inspired everything from tailfin-shaped tidal energy generators to new adhesives based on the pads of gecko feet.  Now designers have turned it on one of our era’s unique dilemmas:  the growing demand for extended memory and cognition in an... Read more...
Biomimicry and the Design Revolution: the New Intelligence
This photo is of artist Theo Jansen's Rhinoceros and is brought to you by Octa, creators of the Whale Kit iPad Handle. Humankind has a proud history of developing technology.  Defined by the Greeks as technologia, it is the creation and use of tools, techniques, crafts and systems in order to solve problems or affect purposes.  As soon as we humans recognized our mortality, we began using fire, clothing, and farming to distance ourselves from the vicissitudes of nature. In the quest for comfort and material security, our species spent... Read more...