The SoundCloud You Loved Is Doomed
Amid rumors of bankruptcy, SoundCloud finds itself where many of its forebears have: slouching unsuccessfully towards scale and profitability.
“Take On Me” music video comes to life with AR
Pack it on up, everyone — someone just won ARKit. We’ve seen loooots of fun stuff made with ARKit already, but this one… this one is something special.
Source: Someone made the “Take On Me” music video come to life with AR and it’s glorious | TechCrunch
Google’s Rules For Designers Working With AI
As part of a new project to humanize AI, the company created a guide to what it calls “human-centered machine learning.”
The digital native is a myth
The younger generation uses technology in the same ways as older people — and is no better at multitasking.
Source: The digital native is a myth : Nature News & Comment
People Have an Irrational Need to Complete ‘Sets’ of Things
People are irrationally motivated to complete arbitrary sets of tasks, donations, or purchases—and organizations can take advantage of that, according to new research by Kate Barasz, Leslie John, Elizabeth Keenan, and Michael Norton.
The Algorithm That Makes Preschoolers Obsessed With YouTube Kids
Surprise eggs and slime are at the center of an online realm that’s changing the way the experts think about human development.
Source: The Algorithm That Makes Preschoolers Obsessed With YouTube Kids – The Atlantic
Replacing desktop computers with AR smartglasses
One Silicon Valley startup called Meta is actually doing this right now.
Source: People are already replacing desktop computers with AR smartglasses: VIDEO – Business Insider
Comcast, CBS ‘ahead of curve’ in linear pay-TV business
Putting his futurist hat on, Barclays analyst Kannan Venkateshwar predicts that the linear pay-TV business will lose around 31 million customers over the next decade.
Turn Off Your Push Notifications. All of Them.
RIP my mentions.
Source: Turn Off Your Push Notifications. All of Them | WIRED
Battle for the K-12 Market
If there’s a common thread that unites the rival technology giants Apple, Google, and Microsoft in the education market, it’s this: They’re big. The three major tech companies—along with Amazon, a relatively new player on the scene—go head-to-head in vying for big chunks of school business, most notably in sales of devices and operating systems, and they try to forge their own paths in others. At the same time, all of them are best known for their work outside education, through their sales to consumers, businesses, or both.
The Pendulum Swing Of Disruption
When a new technology disrupts a traditional incumbent, it normally does so by being 3 things to the end user:
- Cheaper/free
- Quicker
- More convenient
Napster, YouTube, Amazon, Uber, Netflix, all of these companies have done exactly this. Because they most often build market share and presence using external funding, such companies turn existing economics upside down with loss leading tactics. The result is that audiences switch in their millions and incumbents are left in tatters. Any old business that relies on scarcity economics will be swept away.
Source: The Internet’s Adolescence: The Real World Catches Up Eventually | Music Industry Blog
22-year-old stopped ransomware malware virus
The researcher — who is known as MalwareTech on Twitter — registered a garbled domain name hidden in the malware to track the virus, a move that halted it.
Source: Marcus Hutchins is 22-year-old who stopped ransomware malware virus – Business Insider
Sports-free cable TV bundles
Several cable networks are trying to put together a sports-free online TV package for less than $20 a month, but Disney doesn’t think it will work.
Source: Sports-free cable TV bundle: Disney, Discovery weigh in – Business Insider
Facebook’s 10-Year Masterplan
Here are the technologies that Facebook is working on to try and transform the company into a $1 trillion behemoth over the next 10 years.
Source: Infographic: The Progress of Facebook’s 10-Year Masterplan
Instagram Hits Escape Velocity
Instagram, now with 700 million users, resembles Facebook in 2009 to 2012, when it went from being something people used occasionally to something they use every day.
Source: Why Instagram Is Becoming Facebook’s Next Facebook – The New York Times
Snapchat Branded Geofilters
Snapchat maker Snap Inc. is allowing its ad partners in the US, UK, Australia, and Canada to sell and manage sponsored geofilters for the first time.
Source: Snapchat opens up paid geofilters to outside ad partners – Business Insider
How to make Twitter profitable
So, here’s a proposal to radically change the economics of Twitter: Charge businesses that exceed a set number of followers (perhaps 250,000) a monthly fee based on their total number of followers. To provide a sense of scale, here are the follower counts for a cross-section of well-known brands:
@TeslaMotors 1.4 million
@Verizon 1.7 million
@Pepsi 3.1 million
@CocaCola 3.4 million
@McDonalds 3.4 million
@Intel 4.7 million
@Marvel 4.9 million
@GoogleChrome 6.1million
@SamsungMobile 12.1 million
@Google 17.6 million
The More You Use Facebook, the Worse You Feel
Online social interactions are no substitute for the real thing.
Source: A New, More Rigorous Study Confirms: The More You Use Facebook, the Worse You Feel
Snapchat Goes Down
Things haven’t gone so well for tech’s most darling IPO of 2017. Snap had a blistering March 2 debut, which saw its first trade occur at $24 after pricing at $17. The stock hit an all-time high of $27.09 on March 3, but has been in a tailspin ever since.
Snap received several “sell” ratings early on as analysts questioned its ability to deal with competition from bigger companies. “Investors in Snap will be exposed to an upstart facing aggressive competition from much larger companies, with a core user base that is not growing by much and which is only relatively elusive,” Brian Wieser, an analyst at Pivotal Research Group, wrote as he placed a $10 target on the stock the day Snap went public.
Netflix Knows What You Really Like to Watch
Netflix, as you may have heard, is killing off its stars. At a recent news conference at its headquarters in Los Gatos, Calif., the company announced it was shedding its former one-to-five-star rating system in favor of binary digits: namely, thumbs up or thumbs down. “Now it’s easier to tell us what you like,” the site promises.
