DNews is at CES -- all week! Anthony is posting an update a day on all of the coolest ... stuff he's seeing at the biggest consumer electronics show only on Earth.
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Then, Laci Green explains how obsessing over Facebook updates might actually be GOOD for you. Whaaaaa?
Don't forget to check out all the other excellent videos we've got on the DNews YouTube channel.
Obsessive Facebook Updates Are Good for You?!
Walk down any street and you're likely to encounter a symphony of car horns, sidewalk chatter and the whir of traffic on wet asphalt. If you've ever wished you could bottle all that noise up and easily turn it into an audio remix, Jun Fujiwara's Re: Sound Bottle has got you covered.
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The Tokyo-based Tama Art University student's playful project is a recording device encased in a smoky bottle. Uncork it, record a sound and a flashing light lets you know it's been captured by the audio database. The recording software will create a remix that will playback every time the bottle is uncorked. Each time it's recorked, the Re: Sound Bottle resets and a new remix can be created. If you want to pause the remix, give the bottle a shake.
"I felt something missing in the habitual use of music reproduction media, so I thought to create an interactive music medium that changes," Fujiwara explained on his Vimeo page. "The sounds that are heard all the time every day carry infinite possibilities and help us reaffirm the enjoyment of music. I hope people can experience their own music."
BLOG: 'Print' Records Of Your Digital Music
The design won Fujiwara the Naoki Sakai Prize at the Mitsubishi Chemical Junior Design Awards last year. So far, Re: Sound Bottle only exists as a prototype, but there's talk of a Kickstarter campaign to get the device on the market.
Credit: Jun Fujiwara, Vimeo
This is hipstertastic: An audiophile has figured out a way to print 3-D records out of resin that play her digital music. It just needs a little fine-tuning.
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Amanda Ghassaei, an assistant tech editor for the project-sharing site Instructables.com, came up with a technique to print some of her Mp3s onto resin records. She started by writing a program that imports raw audio data from the file, performs calculations to generate the geometry of a 12-inch record, and then exports that geometry to a 3-D printable file format, according to the description on her site.
Then, to print the actual records she used an Objet Connex500 resin printer. The resulting resin 33 RPM records can be played on regular turntables. Hat tip to Eric Evenchick at Hackaday.com and Gizmag's Paul Ridden.
The process needs refining, though, because while the songs are recognizable you can still hear a constant whisking and scratching sound underneath them. Ghassaei admits the quality is about a quarter of the original Mp3. Here's her video demo, including songs by The Pixies and Nirvana:
This Ice-Cold Record Actually Plays
While it isn't the best audio, I could see 3-D printed records taking off in certain circles once the quality improves. Back in the day, kids poured their energy into mixed tapes. Then there were CD mixes, and now we've got...flash drives I guess. But those feel impersonal. Now a mixed record, that'd be a harmonious blend of the old and the new.
Photo: A resin record made from a digital file using a unique 3-D printing technique. Credit: Amanda Ghassaei
Nothing like shreddin' the gnar and carvin' up some sick rooster tails on the snowy slopes, eh? The fresh mountain air. Snowflakes falling on the pines. And, now, thanks to this Beats by Dre ski helmet, you can customize this winter wonderland with a totally wicked soundtrack.
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The helmet is part of the popular BUG Communication line from ski and snowboard maker POC. The Beats headphones and microphone are simply integrated into the neck roll. Good news if you already have a POC helmet: you can buy the neck roll separately.
But be prepared to shell out some dough. After all, the units do have the coveted Beats by Dre logo. The complete helmet is $330, while the individual neck roll in $180.
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However, since wearing earbuds and headphones with regular helmets is uncomfortable, if not, downright impossible, $330 might be a small price to pay for rippin' down a hill while listening to AC/DC's "Whole Lotta Rosie."
Credit: POC
If you've ever had your iPhone stolen, you have have erased it completely using Apple's "Find my iPhone." This feature, which can be accessed online or through another iOS device, allows you to remotely lock your missing device with a four-digit passcode. You can even go so far as to delete your personal data and restore your iPhone, iPad, iPod touch, or Mac to its factory settings.
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Yesterday, Apple quietly released an update to the app that will show user's a road map to the exact location of a missing iPhone, iPad or iPod. When searching for the device's location on another iOS device, a tiny car icon will show up on the screen and when prompted, will provide directions to the lost device's whereabouts. The feature is only available on Apple device running iOS 6, so if you haven't already, bite the bullet and upgrade, if this kind of thing is important to you.
One would like to think this feature was added to serve as a memory jogger for those who may have left their phone somewhere and not as a tracker for a potential thief. Just be sure to have a cool head if you decide to hunt down your iPhone. It may be best to let the authorities handle it, or bring a big friend.
via PCMag
Credit: Rob Pegoraro / Discovery
It's safe to say that iPod and iPhone users everywhere had a little bit of a freak out when the charger adapter went from the standard 30-pin to the smaller Lightning connector. It changes everything from docking stations to cases. But if your biggest concern is streaming music, this tiny ribbon from Blue Ant may help.
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The Ribbon is a stereo Bluetooth streamer than can pair with any device to stream music to just about any kind of player. It plays well with devices that have Bluetooth capabilities. Equipped with a 3.5MM AUX cable, the Ribbon can plug into a home or car stereo to stream music straight from your mobile device without having to connect it to anything. The device can clip onto clothes or just hangout in a cup holder in the car. It even works as a remote for playback or calls.
It's small, discreet and universally helpful for any kind of mobile device user, not just beleaguered iDevice owners.
Credit: Blue Ant
Beyerdynamic T 50 p: $289; Bowers & Wilkins P3: $199
To help wade through the seemingly countless options on the market, two Discovery colleagues share their insights on 20 new and relevant headphones. Taking on a pair at a time, Scott Tharler and Alice Truong will each evaluate how these contemporary cans match up in a dueling series called Headphones Heads Up.
Headquartered in Germany, Beyerdynamic has a strong focus in the microphone and conference technology space. But they're reputed by audiophiles as having fashioned some of the best headphones ever, including the amazing $1,400 T 5 p. Although definitively luxurious, those are nowhere near petite. So we gave the nod to their little cousin, the T 50 p ($289), which themselves are quite fetching and finely engineered. They're up against the stunningly minimalist P3 ($199.99) from Bowers & Wilkins, known to most Apple/audio fans as the creative designers behind the iconic and uber-popular football-shaped Zeppelin iPod docks. With both such well-pedigreed, high quality class acts, we certainly set ourselves up for a close call in this tenth and final headphones heads-up of the series.
Head over to Discovery.com for Alice Truong's review of these cans.
As far as I'm concerned, the P3 model name stands for pretty, pristine and powerful. These gorgeous on-ear headphones excel in every category. They look lean, with dual metallic lines undulating elegantly, precisely joining the two-tone headband to their similarly adorned earpads. Consistent with the inside of the headband, the earpads are covered in a soft, sumptuous, high-performance acoustic fabric. In lieu of three protruding buttons, the round, super-thin iPad/iPod/iPhone-compatible in-line remote succumbs to a gentle indent in the middle of one side. The result was an intuitive tacticle experience for changing the volume, scanning through tracks or skipping over them. They are sleek and nimble right down to the way they fold into a very compact semi-circular plastic hardcase.
But enough about the P3's physicality, how was the audio? Superb. They especially sung through classical, live and acoustic songs; but they were right at the top of their game in rock, reggae and every one of the dozens of genres I sampled with them. I heard wide, opulent bass; strong, clear mids; and crisp, well-defined treble. Although many of the headphones we tested overreached their acceptable bounds on the high end and got hissy, these never faltered. They also didn't distort at high volumes when played from a phone, tablet or laptop. At the risk of echoing the marketing copy on the Bowers website, I agree that they do sound natural, balanced and "give the best possible sound from a small set of headphones." In fact, they're easily my favorite headphones -- on-ear or over, powered or not -- for under $200.
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Unfortunately, that leaves the T 50 p as an also-ran in this race, which is a shame on a few levels. First, UPS did everything in their power to make sure I never got a chance to experience them in person; but I finally did just a few days ago (no thanks to the folks in brown). These cans have a very cool sort of industrial look and comfy feel going on. They're great for travel, with included in-flight and quarter-inch adapters, along with a nylon carrying case that quickly opens simply by peeling back a single strap. With their soft, comfy, foam- and gel-filled earpads to your ear, they offer ample passive noise reduction. And as with all the Beyer headphones I've heard, I enjoyed their sound. It was mostly clear and open, except for a certain idiosyncratic tightness somewhere in the low-to-mid range. It was subtle, but I heard a slight muddle on a couple of different synth and vocal-heavy tracks.
Don't get me wrong, the T 50 p do pump out great audio. Probably in the top four or five best from amongst the 20 we've reviewed in this series. Truly superior supra aural headphones in general, just not over their adversary here (the P3), which I believe better epitomizes the petite luxury category. My final take on the relative values of both: If their price tags were reversed, I wouldn't hesitate to buy either headphone.
Credit: Alice Truong/Discovery
Scott Tharler writes about gadgets for Discovery News and covers travel tech for Fodor's. Follow him on Twitter, gdgt and Google Plus. Alice Truong writes about tech and gadgets for Discovery Channel. Follow her on Twitter and Google Plus.
Sennheiser MM 450-X: $450; SuperTooth Melody: $99
To help wade through the seemingly countless options on the market, two Discovery colleagues share their insights on 20 new and relevant headphones. Taking on a pair at a time, Scott Tharler and Alice Truong will each evaluate how these contemporary cans match up in a dueling series called Headphones Heads Up.
Well respected for their impressive range of high-quality wired and wireless headphones, we selected Sennheiser's MM 450-X headphones for this series. As fate would have it, just after that we heard that SuperTooth -- known for their Bluetooth speakers and voice-activated speakerphones -- was coming out with a brand new set of headphones called Melody. Despite the disparity in price, we were intrigued by the concept of a travel-friendly wireless headphone match-up: the headphone experts vs. the Bluetooth specialists.
Head over to Discovery.com for Alice Truong's review of these cans.
As expected, the Sennheisers pumped out terrific sound, with sharp treble, solid vocals and respectable bass. They're certainly both comfortable and -- folding the band and swiveling the cups flat -- compact, with a nice little zip-up pouch. One rad feature I haven't seen elsewhere is a removable Micro-USB rechargeable battery. With it slid out, it was nice that the headphones still offered wired sound, although then (both figuratively and literally) they lacked power. For on-ear headphones, they did a good job of both passively and actively canceling outside noise. And they canceled inside noise as well -- that is, they had a button that attenuated the music and activated a mic, allowing you to temporarily hear someone talking to you without having to take off your headphones.
I wasn't sure what to expect from the SuperTooth headphones. I'm a fan of their HD speakerphone and the original Disco speaker kicks butt...BUT, headphones are a different story. They passed the audio test. Not better than the Sennheisers by any stretch, but about where they should be for the price. Having the volume controls in a thumb-friendly underneath the right can rather than on its face felt natural to me. Unfortunately, the controls that were on its face (power, track skip) were awkwardly stiff and tough to operate.
If you're the kind of person who likes to hit play and listen for hours, the SuperTooth Melody offers a comfy enough fit and decent enough sound for the money. But ironically, because of the poor tactile experience I had with the touch-unfriendly controls, they seemed like they should've been twenty or thirty bucks cheaper. Likewise, the Sennheisers present an attractive headphone with cool features. And I'd say to run out and get them...if they were half the price. But they weren't luxurious enough to make me want to drop four-plus bills. Perhaps they should take a cue from the headphones we'll be featuring in tomorrow's Headphones Heads-Up, the final face-off of the series!
Credit: Alice Truong/Discovery
Scott Tharler writes about gadgets for Discovery News and covers travel tech for Fodor's. Follow him on Twitter, gdgt and Google Plus. Alice Truong writes about tech and gadgets for Discovery Channel. Follow her on Twitter and Google Plus.
Among the very latest iPhone evolutions officially announced today were Apple's new EarPods. As much as these purportedly more durable and natural fitting earphones may augment the i-audio experience, there are (at least) six functions these new and improved buds won't be able to perform:
1. Stay Out of Your Ears. We got an advanced listen of the upcoming AfterShokz Sportz M2 bone conduction earphones (due out later this month) and were very impressed with their improvements over the original AfterShokz: A significantly smaller, now Micro-USB rechargeable control unit with added volume buttons; a slightly longer headband; and (most importantly) substantially fuller, noticeably richer sound. As with their predecessor, they leave your ear canal open, which is safer, less distracting and more comfortable -- especially for all you folks who can't seem to find an earbud to fit and stay in your quirky ears.
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2. Reassign Its In-Line Button. Although the well-designed Jays a-Jays One+ have other merits, it's their Headset Control companion Android app that makes them unique. It features two modes, Easy and Advanced. They let you reassign the earphones' sole button to initiate voice commands, control music/calls, and/or launch settings/apps. Between single-, double- and triple-tapping and (not) holding of the button, that gives you six functions to assign and activate. And because we all multi-click at different speeds, you can adjust the click interval to match yours.
3. Stay Untangled. After a successful Kickstarter campaign that tripled its funding goal, CordCruncher is an actual selling product -- available in Glo Orange, Matte Black or Pearl Blue. As we wrote in April, it's great being able to yank your buds out or back rather than having to take the time to disentangle them every time you listen and carefully wind them back up every time you're done (or face the consequences). Although several cord management systems have cropped up lately, this is the quickest and coolest of 'em.
4. Go Wireless. The superb Phiaton PS 210 BTNC earphones are angled for a secure, steady fit and sublime sound. They also feature a winning combo of both Bluetooth and active noise cancellation. And their rechargeable control unit elegantly gives audio confirmations as it powers on/off, pairs and connects to your audio source.
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5. Go Underwater. Whether rockin' out in the shower or catching tuneage as you snorkel, it's cool having earphones that can go underwater (and live to rock again). Waterproof down to 10 feet for up to three hours, DryBuds Sport are great for any aqua-based athletics -- or any time you don't want to have to worry about being splashed. Of course, they work on land and while at leisure as well.
6. Prevent Hearing Loss. Turn it up! Or should you? Most folks (especially you youngsters out there) do so without considering the consequences. With dBLogic's earphones you don't have to. They deliver clean, undistorted music that's loud enough, but maxes out at 85 dB so it won't cause short- or long-term ear damage. If you're so enamored with iPhone's standard earphones but also care about your hearing, check out dBLogic's universal adapter.
Credit: JIRO/Corbis
When it comes to the "indieness" of what makes indie-music so painstakingly avant-garde, Zack Galifianakis and Michael Showalter brilliantly sum up the debate with this fake interview in what amounts to a snake eating its own tail.
However, all lampooning aside, there are those musicians who are erasing barriers and they're anything but silent.
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For example, Luke Fischbeck of Lucky Dragons. He's redefining not only how music is made, but how we experience it. More importantly, his work poses the question: Who exactly is the musician? Furthermore, shattered is the notion that the performer and audience are separate entities.
Best representative of this concept is his piece "Making a Baby." Get your mind out of the gutter -- performances of the piece do not involve sex, but there is a lot of touching. Consider it artistic procreation that gives birth to a musical experience like no other.
Fischbeck uses a sound card that issues high-frequency carrier signals to cables that are strung out beyond the stage to the audience members who are encouraged to pick them up. Once they do, they cease to be the audience and become makers of the music. That's because, as people touch the leads of the cables, custom software detects fluctuations in the amplitude of the carrier signal, triggering an array of audio effects, samples, passage shifts, filter sweeps, lighting and/or animation, just to name a few.
Not only that, as members of what used to be known as the audience touch each other, the sounds shift even more. As Eliot Van Buskirk noted in a recent profile on Fischbeck in Wired, at one performance he witnessed "art kids and scenesters...touching each other, and ultimately writhing about on the ground."
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So, you can see why "Making a Baby" is a good title for this project, sheerly for its ability to provoke a bunch of art kids to thrash around like spawning salmon. I'll leave it to you bitter cycnics to make the joke about salmon dying after they spawn.
"All of these mythologies about 'crossing the proscenium' or 'breaking through the fourth wall' in performance -- it just becomes irrelevant," Fischbeck told Wired. "A performance or interaction is created equally from all sides at once, you know? Whether it's technology or interface setting the rules of the engagement, you also have everything that the user -- the person participating in it -- brings to it. It’s really a cooperation between equals."
At least this remedies the pandemic plague of most so-called indie-show audiences: the dreaded arms-crossed head nod while standing aloofly in place.
