WhoSampled App Scans Your Music Collection, Identifies All the Samples

By Duncan Geere, Wired UK June 19, 2012

'WhoSampled.com’s vast database has long been a source for music geeks to identify where their favorite samples came from, but now it’s coming to your smartphone too.

The WhoSampled iPhone app scans your music library and automatically shows you all the samples, covers and remixes associated with all of the artists and tracks in it. Plus, if you’re listening to a song and you want to access its data immediately, you can switch to the WhoSampled app from your music player and it’ll display all the musical connections for whatever’s playing....'

7 (Video) Lessons for Managers of UX - Adaptive Path

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Excerpt:

"The Adaptive Path iPad app has just been updated to include speaker videos from the 2012 MX Conference. Here's a few takeaways to help you start to dig in:

1. A UX manager's job is problem-framing, not problem-solving
— Kip Lee, Four Meta-Strategies for Design and Management

2. Emotional insights should also be treated as data for business decisions
— Kip Lee, Four Meta-Strategies for Design and Management

3. UX managers are translators of business strategies into design opportunities for staff
— Sara Koury, in Ian Swinson's How Did I Get Here?
...

The Best 'Prometheus' Analyses So Far | Criticwire

Original post by BY MATT SINGER | JUNE 18, 2012

"The following post, along with every single link it contains, includes SPOILERS for "Prometheus." Like here's one right here: SPOILER -- alien gods from the ancient past have amazing abs. But they're as stingy with their dieting secrets as they are with the origins of life in the universe...

The Best "Prometheus" Analyses So Far (With Lots of SPOILERS)

1. Adrian Bott on "Prometheus"' Mythological Motifs

"We know something about the Engineers, a founding principle laid down in the very first scene: acceptance of death, up to and including self-sacrifice, is right and proper in the creation of life. Prometheus, Osiris, John Barleycorn, and of course the Jesus of Christianity are all supposed to embody this same principle. It is held up as one of the most enduring human concepts of what it means to be 'good.' Seen in this light, the perplexing obscurity of the rest of the film yields to an examination of the interwoven themes of sacrifice, creation, and preservation of life."

2. Jon Korn on the Film's Literary Ancestry

"Examining Lovecraft and Clarke's own takes on ancient astronauts also allows us to see where, in macro terms, 'Prometheus''s narrative stumbles. Both the older authors succeed by limiting our contact with the superior races they describe, rendering them fittingly unknowable. In contrast, 'Prometheus' tries have it both ways, giving the Engineers a lot of screen time while keeping their intentions frustratingly opaque. It becomes hard to parse their reasoning for initiating life on Earth, then returning often to the planet during early human development, and ultimately wanting to destroy the same beings they created. While it probably would have run counterintuitive to the studio notes, I think the film's plot would be vastly improved by an injection of the same mystery that Lovecraft and Clarke so artfully deploy. (And it would lead more organically to the sequel so artlessly implied.)"

3. Drew McWeeny on What Does and Doesn't Work About "Prometheus"

"Ultimately, my biggest question about the film is 'Why didn't Ridley just make the 'Blade Runner' sequel instead?' It's obvious watching the film that David is the character he's most interested in, and the questions he explores with David would work just as well in the 'Blade Runner' world. If Ridley wanted to play the game with a character who might or might not be a Replicant, as it appears he's doing with Vickers, then why not do that in the actual 'Blade Runner' world as well?"

4. Steven James Snyder Decodes "Prometheus"' Mysteries..."

Read the Original Post here:

http://blogs.indiewire.com/criticwire/the-best-prometheus-analysis-on-the-int...

How Cyberpunk Saved Sci-Fi - Underwire - Taking the Pulse of Pop Culture

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By Paulo Bacigalupi June 20, 2012 Illustration: Eero Pitkänen

'The Windup Girl author Paolo Bacigalupi on what we can learn from the cyberpunk breakthrough.

Science fiction was stuck in a complacent groove by the 1980s. You could go into a bookstore and find Arthur C. Clarke’s next Odyssey installment or Isaac Asimov’s books about the three laws of robotics. Robert Heinlein was still churning out sex and philosophy.

But despite the efforts of a variety of literary insurgencies, science fiction felt very much like it did 20 or 30 years before. It was a La-Z-Boy-recliner experience of the future. Competent men of science did competent things, aerospace was the coolest tech, and politics revolved around the conflicts of nation states.

And then came cyberpunk—Pat Cadigan, William Gibson, Bruce Sterling. It was subversive and gritty, a poetry-kaleidoscope trip into the for-profit future. Faceless corporations loomed over the ant-sized dramas of human endeavors, moving billions of dollars and yen around the globe while the human beings of the story scrapped it out on the streets.

It was cyberspace and console cowboys, leather jackets, Zeiss eye implants, modded Russian knockoff prostheses, extinct horses, mirrorshades. The future was bizarre and threatening—and also strangely real....'

Cartoon Network's iPhone and iPad app adds a live TV feed, for authenticated customers - Engadget

Excerpt:

By Richard Lawler posted Jun 19th 2012 9:34PM

"Cartoon Network announced plans to join the TV Everywhere party with a live internet feed of its channel (for authenticated cable / satellite customers) during upfronts and now the updated v1.8 app has arrived on iPhones and iPads. The feed can also be streamed with Flash on the channel's website (we tried it on an Android 2.3 device and logged in but couldn't get it to play), although the only differences we noticed were that the website feed was slightly ahead of our cable box and iOS was a few seconds behind, but with slightly higher picture quality. All in all it's very similar to the WatchESPN experience (which ABC expanded upon last week with Watch Disney, Watch Disney Jr and Watch DisneyXD apps, though the full experience is only currently available to Comcast customers), and should satisfy all those who have been missing the Toonami experience when they're away from home. Take a peek after the break for a preview trailer, shot of the login screen and press release...."

CONVERGENCE: Seven Kingdoms, Five Senses | Game of Thrones #transmedia

Excerpt:

POSTED BY MATT BOLISH ON 6.19.2012

"A collaboration between Film Society's Convergence program and StoryCode, our ongoing series of StoryForums have provided monthly gatherings for fans and creators to discuss the art of immersive storytelling. One such meeting earlier this year promised to explore some of the most compelling and equally vexing questions related to creating successful transmedia experiences—a presentation from transmedia creator Steve Coulson covering his work on promoting the first season of HBO’s award winning Game of Thrones series.

Unfortunately I can't tell you much about it.

The Magician's Code, that most scared of agreements between practitioners of stage magic, was invoked not more then three minutes after the event began by Coulson (formerly known in London’s magic circles as Scaramouch), effectively forbidding the capacity crowd from talking, typing, or tweeting about anything discussed. The code is strict: never share the secrets of how a trick is done with non-magicians, no matter how tempting. You will understand, then, why I must tread lightly, lest I call down the vengeance of legions of card-wielding, flash powder-armed illusionists...."

Technology - Megan Garber - Nerds of the World, Unite! iTunes U Just Got Interactive - The Atlantic

Excerpt from The Atlantic:

By Megan Garber:

"If you are a nerd, or just an aspiring one, there are few things more fantastic on the Internet than iTunes U. One of the earliest online education initiatives, the feature -- a little corner of the broader iTunes content environment -- brings together video- and audio-recorded lectures from colleges and universities around the world. Want to learn philosophy from Oxford? Download the 41 lectures from the university's eight-week-long General Philosophy course. Curious about the history of ancient Greece? Turn Yale's lectures on that subject into podcasts that you listen to as you're doing your dishes. iTunes' education initiative is an occasionally overwhelming and often enlightening smorgasbord of digitized, customized learning.

And! The whole thing is free for users. Which means that you -- the nerd, whether current or aspiring -- can recreate the university lecture experience for pretty much any subject, for pretty much nothing save your time...."