Feed aggregator

Apple TV's Meager Offerings Are Due to Business, Not Tech

Wired Top Stories - Thu, 09/02/2010 - 21:00
This week’s big Apple announcement featured one big disappointment: Apple TV’s relative lack of, well, TV. Out of all of the hundreds of channels available on cable and satellite, only ABC and Fox agreed to offer their programs for rent on Apple TV. The fact that Steve Jobs is the largest single shareholder in, and on the board of, Disney — owner of ABC — perfectly illustrates this digital divide.


Clustered Networks Spread Behavior Change Faster

Wired Top Stories - Thu, 09/02/2010 - 20:45
Unlike infectious disease and information, behavior change spreads faster through online networks that have many close connections instead of many distant ties. Redundancy is key, as people are more likely to engage in a behavior if they see many others doing it. "There has been a lot of theory about the difference between information and behavior spreading," said economic sociologist Damon Centola of MIT and author of the study published Sept. 3 in Science. "We've assumed that they are the same, but you can imagine that behavior is not really like that, that you need to be convinced."


Exotic New Mars Images From Orbiting Telephoto Studio

Wired Top Stories - Thu, 09/02/2010 - 20:13
A new batch of sharp Martian close-ups from NASA's HiRISE camera were released, and we've gathered some of the best in the gallery.


Exoplanet Shows Gas Giants Start as Dusty Behemoths

Wired Top Stories - Thu, 09/02/2010 - 20:00
The atmosphere of a young exoplanet didn't fit any of our existing models for what gas giants should look like. But when astronomers added huge dust clouds, it was a perfect fit, perhaps revealing a larger truth about gas giants.


Earth's Magnetic Field Flipped Superfast

Wired Top Stories - Thu, 09/02/2010 - 19:30
Magnetic minerals in 15-million-year-old rocks appear to preserve a moment when the magnetic north pole was rapidly on its way to becoming the south pole, and vice versa.


Mobile Devices Need Custom Maps

Wired Top Stories - Thu, 09/02/2010 - 19:29
Development Seed is engineering tools to create custom maps that work in a wider variety of situations such as natural disasters and in the developing world.


Mass Extinctions Change the Rules of Evolution

Wired Top Stories - Thu, 09/02/2010 - 19:00
A reinterpretation of the fossil record suggests a new answer to one of evolution's existential questions: whether global mass extinctions are just short-term diversions in life's preordained course, or send life careening down wholly new paths.


First Look: Official Twitter App for iPad Feels Smooth as Butter

Wired Top Stories - Thu, 09/02/2010 - 19:00
The official Twitter app for iPad is finally here, and star developer Loren Brichter has polished yet another gem. Twitter for iPad sports a really elegant interface that's significantly faster and more intuitive than competing Twitter clients we've tested (such as Twitterific and Tweetdeck).


Fujitsu ScanSnap Counts Quality Over Quantity

Wired Top Stories - Thu, 09/02/2010 - 18:33
Fujitsu's scanner is your new (albeit bulky) buddy if you want high-quality images. The sturdy document feeder gets pages in straight, so you get them out right.


Chrome 6 Arrives, Just in Time for Cake

Wired Top Stories - Thu, 09/02/2010 - 18:31
Google is celebrating the second birthday of its Chrome web browser with the release of Chrome 6. Among the new features are an updated user interface, auto-fill for web forms, extension syncing, increased speed and numerous bug fixes.


How Apple Just Disrupted the Cable Guys

Wired Top Stories - Thu, 09/02/2010 - 18:11
People in Silicon Valley have focused on the set-top box as the lever to attack the cable industry. Cable boxes blow, but that's a losing battle. So why is Apple TV different? Because Steve Jobs has not just created a new set top box. He's actually created a whole new media ecosystem built around the mobile phone.


Two-Wheeled Zerotracer EV Is a Wild Ride

Wired Top Stories - Thu, 09/02/2010 - 18:07
It looks like a motorcycle, it performs like a Lotus and it's racing around the world.


String Theory Finally Does Something Useful

Wired Top Stories - Thu, 09/02/2010 - 18:00
String theory has finally made a prediction that can be tested with experiments — but in a completely unexpected realm of physics: quantum entanglement.


Ancient Nubians Made Antibiotic Beer

Wired Top Stories - Thu, 09/02/2010 - 17:30
Chemical analysis of the bones of an ancient Sudanese Nubians who lived nearly 2,000 years ago shows they were ingesting the antibiotic tetracycline on a regular basis — likely from a special brew of beer. The find is the strongest yet to support that antibiotics were previously discovered by humans before Alexander Fleming discovered penicillin in 1928.


Samsung Introduces Its 7-Inch Tablet to Rival iPad

Wired Top Stories - Thu, 09/02/2010 - 17:06
Samsung has announced the launch of a tablet that could become the first major Android-powered challenger to the Apple iPad.


Heavy European Snowfall Caused by 'Weather Collision'

Wired Top Stories - Thu, 09/02/2010 - 17:00
The uncharacteristically snowy weather that hit Northern Europe and North America in the winter of 2009 to 2010 was caused by a rare combination of two separate weather oscillations in the Atlantic and Pacific, claim meteorologists.


'Earth One' Reboots Superman's Roots for the iGeneration

Wired Top Stories - Thu, 09/02/2010 - 17:00
Superman is a surly noob searching for reality in the digital age in J. Michael Straczynski and Shane Davis' update of the superhero's origin story. Who knew the Man of Steel would miss the musty Daily Planet more than the rest of us?


Vets Get Ecstasy to Treat Post-Traumatic Stress

Wired Top Stories - Thu, 09/02/2010 - 11:00
Two psychiatric experts think the way to treat troops returning home with PTSD: Have them undergo intensive psychotherapy while they're rolling on ecstasy.


Sept. 2, 1969: First U.S. ATM Starts Doling Out Dollars

Wired Top Stories - Thu, 09/02/2010 - 11:00
Six weeks after landing men on the moon, Americans take another giant leap for mankind with the nation’s first cash-spewing, automated teller machine.


FaceTime Lets You Share Your Point of View

Wired Top Stories - Thu, 09/02/2010 - 11:00
Video calls aren't for people to see you — they're for people to see what you see.


Syndicate content