Bits Blog: Daily Report: E-Book Services Track Readers’ Habits

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Bits Blog: Daily Report: Intel Aims to Remake the TV Landscape

Intel’s ambition to sell a bundle of television channels to subscribers over the Internet is running up against stiff resistance from cable and satellite companies, Brian Stelter reports in The New York Times.

The incumbent distributors are pressing owners of cable channels, with whom they have lucrative long-term contracts, not to sign contracts with upstarts like Intel.

But Intel’s executives intend to turn on its TV service by the end of the year. They are ready to pay more than existing distributors do for channels, though they have yet to announce any deals.

Prospective services like Intel TV, delivered over broadband services provided by the likes of Comcast and Time Warner Cable, have the potential to radically alter the media marketplace. Unlike Netflix, which sells a library of TV episodes and mainly supplements cable, a service like Intel’s — with dozens of channels, big and small, streaming through a modern interface — could cause more consumers to cancel their cable subscriptions.

And if Intel’s service ever goes on sale, industry executives predict that others will quickly follow.

EXCLUSIVE: Hip Hop News Daily Talks To YMCMB’s Latest Family Member, T.Rone- “Hello Love (FU),” About Rock Influences, Signing To YMCMB, & ‘Lust’ Music

I constantly heard this song over and over again, and I was wondering who was the guy singing, 

Hello Love!
I know ya deal,
And I know y can get me killed (get me killed).
How dare ya judge, the ways of lust
When you’re the reason that I don’t trust?
F*ck you Love! F*ck you Love!

Welp, after doing some research I was able to determine that it was YMCMB’s latest signee, T.Rone from Jacksonville, FL. The guy’s track is in heavy rotation and Hip Hop News Daily had to hear from him.

In a pretty interesting  interview, the Duval representer tells us his musical influences, his perception of lust, and more. Let me just say this guy has one hell of a vibrant personality…Anyway, take a look at what he said below:

HHND: I understand that you were recently signed to YMCMB. How did that happen?

T. Rone: The song was playing heavy in Miami and Birdman reached out-I flew down to Miami and he liked what he heard and I signed.

HHND: Cool. Now, tell us about the concept of Hello Love (FU). Where did that originate from?

T. Rone: Everybody has said FU love and turn right back around just to say hello again. I left the club one night and went into the studio and the beat dropped. That’s how I was feeling that night.

HHND: With this sound, there are not many people that sound like you, so to speak? What are your influences?

T. Rone: A lot of my influence comes from Rock music-street Rock influences like Kurt Cobain of Nirvana.

HHND: What would you call the type of music do you create?

T. Rone: I don’t put myself in a box- I create lust music.

HHND: What’s lust music?

T. Rone: Too much love music. The industry has lost its’ rawness and there is nothing wrong with lust. There’s a thin line between love and lust and I think its ok to lust. Lust doesn’t have to always be sexual. It can be about life and other things. Lust isn’t always a bad thing.

HHND: Some people have compared you to T-Pain. How do you respond to that?

T. Rone: There’s no comparison. On that song (Hello Love) that’s all me and no auto tune.

HHND: Did T-Pain influence you in any way?

T. Rone: No

HHND: So what are you working on now?

T.Rone: I’m working on a mixtape. It’s called “The Lord of Lust Part 1.” It will be out in the next couple of months.

HHND: Who is on the mixtape?

T. Rone: Right now, 2 Chainz, Juicy J, Fat Joe, Jim Jones, Raheem Devaughn

HHND: Ok cool…we are definitely waiting on that. Thanks for chatting with Hip Hop News Daily.

T. Rone: Cool.

Google Aims to Move Ever More Seamlessly Into Daily Life

Soon, a debate broke out. Was the singer saying, “With burned shed it’s a lovely view?” Or “With blood I shed alone with you?”

Like most people these days, Ms. Cericola knew what to do. She grabbed her BlackBerry and Googled. (The answer, from the song “Scar Tissue”: “With the birds I’ll share this lonely view.”)

“Looking up something really fast actually adds to the conversation,” Ms. Cericola said.

But if Ms. Cericola was content with how quickly she ended the debate, Google and other technology companies are not. They know they are the uninvited guests at social gatherings everywhere, and they want to ingratiate themselves with the hosts by figuring out new, less intrusive ways to join the party — as varied as voice search, Internet-connected glasses and other wearable computers, or dining room tables outfitted with screens.

Googling the answer to a question has become accepted social behavior, but “it’s still somewhat awkward when you see that at a dinner party,” said Amit Singhal, senior vice president in charge of search at Google. “The key to the future is how can you make such conversations socially even more normal?”

Mr. Singhal is talking about what computer scientists call ubiquitous computing or intelligence augmentation — the idea that computers will no longer be devices we turn on, but will be so integrated into our everyday environment that we can ask them to do things without ever lifting a finger.

“It’s not just a question of having screens everywhere or wearing a screen, but also this whole idea of phones and devices becoming more context-aware, so they can offer information that is highly relevant,” said Pattie Maes, founder and director of the M.I.T. Media Lab fluid interfaces group, which studies how to integrate digital information into daily life.

If people are discussing the migratory patterns of monarch butterflies over dinner, for instance, phones will be able to hear that and present a map, she said. Or when you meet someone, your glasses could show you the person’s LinkedIn profile and your last e-mail exchange.

“It’s the integration of the digital and physical worlds so no longer are they two relatively separate spheres where you have to make the connection between them,” Ms. Maes said.

Many tech companies are trying to integrate the two worlds. In Apple’s new iPhone, Siri, the voice-activated assistant, can answer questions about current movies, sports and restaurants.

Microsoft is experimenting with computers that understand gestures and voice, like gloves with sensors, Bing voice search on the Xbox and gesture recognition on the Kinect. I.B.M. is teaching machines to learn and interact with people, including in hospitals. But Google is at the forefront, with vast research about what kinds of questions people want answered — and when.

Google says its internal logs reveal that mobile searches spike during mealtimes, when people are away from their computers but still want information immediately. And people ask more questions about trivia — “How tall is the Statue of Liberty” (answer: 305 feet) and “How old is the earth” (4.54 billion years) — on mobile devices than on computers.

To make these searches easier, last month Google introduced mobile search apps for Android phones and iPhones that let people ask questions aloud and listen to Google answer in a vaguely robotic woman’s voice. The idea is that people do not have to excuse themselves from conversation to type a query, and everyone can hear the answer, as if Google were another guest.

In May, Google introduced fact cards to answer trivia-type queries; these are answers on the search results page, so people do not have to click on a link, wait for a Web page to load and further delay the conversation. Say you urgently need to know Ryan Gosling’s net worth. Search on your phone and above the links to search results, Google tells you. (It is $50 million.)

Google Glass, eyeglass frames that let people use the Web on a tiny screen near their temples, are not yet for sale but will let people find answers without reaching into their pockets. So will other wearable computers that Google plans to experiment with, like watches.

The company is also studying screens that could be built into kitchen walls or dining room tables, to make Google a constant companion that everyone in the room could talk to.

“If we take it to the next step, which we’re excited about, Google and the information I need is right here in the room with me,” said Scott Huffman, the engineering director in charge of mobile search at Google. “As we’re talking, we just say, ‘Hey, Google, blah blah blah,’ and it comes up on a screen or tells you the answer.”

That does not excite everyone. “It sounds like a horrible dystopian nightmare,” said Helena Echlin, who wrote the Table Manners etiquette column at Chow, the food site.

Still, Ms. Echlin says she may change her tune when everyone is wearing computers on their faces. Five years ago, after all, she wrote that no one should ever use a cellphone at mealtime. Now, she said, “you’d have to be a complete Luddite to ban a phone from the dinner table.”

Phil Maslow, 27, who works for a pharmaceutical start-up in New York, has no problem relying on Google at his fingertips, no matter the setting.

“It’s a substitute for a good memory,” he said. “I get to skip a lot of anguish.”

More than once he has been talking to an acquaintance from college at a party, he said, and had no idea who the person was.

“While I was talking to them, I sneakily looked them up on Facebook and then used their name to get me out of a jam,” he said.

One effect of all this Google searching at social events is the resurgence of a retro kind of party, trivia night. At a weekly trivia night run by David Smithyman, 27, in Park Slope, using cellphones is cheating.

“There’s a joy to being stumped by something with your friends for a little while,” Mr. Smithyman said. “Then when you finally do read out the answer, there’s this palpable reaction. It’s a very cool moment that doesn’t really happen in other places anymore.”

App Smart: Daily Journal Writing Without the Inconvenience - App Smart

One problem was that I didn’t always have my journal with me when I had the thought I wanted to jot down.

But now diary or journal writing is easier than ever, because, you guessed it, you can do it on a mobile device.

In my home, the journaling app of choice is Day! — The Best Story of Mine, $1 on iOS. It’s visually appealing, and it gets you into regular writing by providing short text entries with an emphasis on icons.

Tapping a date on the app’s calendar lets you write a new entry or edit an existing one. The writing page is simplicity itself — a blank slate with a small row of icons at the top — which, in my mind, removes some of the fuss and barriers to putting your words down. You simply type on the screen’s keyboard, and you can choose your font by tapping an icon at the top.

What makes Day more attractive than some other diary apps are the functions of the other icons on the menu. With a tap, you can set the background color of the page to match your mood, or perhaps to indicate something significant that happened that day. You can affix a photo, a simple weather icon or a symbolic icon, like a smiley face or birthday cake, from the app’s list.

These icons are displayed when you view your diary entries as a calendar, so you can get a visual reminder at a glance of what each month contains. The background colors appear as a similar visual cue when you view your entries as a list.

The app is password-protectable, and you can export journal data through iTunes, Dropbox or in an e-mail. The app’s main drawback is that it allows just one entry a day, which may not be the way you like to keep a journal. Also, because it’s designed to be so simple, you can only add a single photo for an entry.

If you’re after a more sophisticated, perhaps more grown-up, journaling app, you may prefer Day One — Journal, $5 on iOS. While it, too, emphasizes simplicity, it does allow more than one entry a day.

The writing part of the app is a plain, empty page, with a row of tiny icons that let you tag a location, add weather data downloaded from the Internet, set the date and time, or tag an entry as a favorite.

Like Day, Day One lets you view your past entries in a visual way — either as a simple timeline, as a list of photos appended to the entries, on a calendar display or by whether the entries are marked as favorites. The graphics are mostly gray, so they don’t distract you from your writing; it has password protection; and you can share individual entries via e-mail or Twitter. You can also use entries to check in on Foursquare.

For a similarly formal-feeling journal app on Android, Diaro is a great, no-cost choice. It’s similar to Day One in some ways, but it has the added benefit that you can sort entries by color-coded category, like business or entertainment, and add your own tag words. These extra labels are helpful for viewing your journal entries by category or keyword, which might be of interest if, for example, you mix personal entries with work-related ones.

An alternative free app with a prettier visual design is Memoires: The Diary. It’s just as sophisticated as Diaro, and it has a few extra features that may attract you. For example, you can append a mood icon to an entry, display entries on a map and even record audio clips to add to an entry.

Memoires also lets you organize previous journal entries in a “flow of thoughts” style. Here, you tap on entries and link one to another, flowing from one event, thought or mood to the next.

This may be useful if, for example, you want to link separate entries from a vacation or release your inner James Joyce. The app is more complex than Diaro, however, and that may discourage you from getting into the daily habit.

With so many free and low-cost options for your phone or tablet, there’s no excuse for letting the past slip away.

Quick Calls

Politix, a news site that specializes in political information and bipartisan discussion, recently released a new iPad app and an Android app to complement its earlier iPad app. ... If you’re an iOS device owner, remember to check out the new official YouTube app for your device. It’s fresh from Google, replacing the earlier built-in app from Apple, and it has a few more tricks up its sleeve.

Merchants and Shoppers Sour on Daily Deal Sites Like Groupon

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