A Simpler Page: designing for tablets.

Create your own generative art with Silk.

Twitter’s response to WikiLeaks subpoena should be the industry standard.

Social networks create their own regional dialects.

The mysteries of kisses.

Musical chills related to brain dopamine release.

How to pick the perfect brand name.

Composer Howard Goodall takes us on a journey into music’s underbelly, examining the four basic elements that make it work: Melody, rhythm, harmony and bass (video).

A box truck Is just a room on wheels: scenes from San Francisco’s (secret) Lost Horizon Night Market.

Once a rumor, now fact: CIA used modern art as propaganda weapon.

Wikileaks and the Long Haul by Clay Shirky.

Meet the most dangerous man in cyberspace: The American face of Wikileaks.

Apple and the politics of phoney outrage.

Modern House Numbers giveaway.

Curated hypocrisy: How Google camouflages its attacks on Apple.

Biomimicry Challenge: IDEO Taps Octopi and Flamingos to Reorganize the USGBC.

How Cul-de-Sacs Are Killing Your Community.

Polar Beer pint glasses, for fans of Lost.

88% of Lost Wallets Containing Baby Photos Get Returned: How To Use That Fact to Boost Business.

The Shirky Principle: “Institutions will try to preserve the problem to which they are the solution.”

Marvel Comics for the iPad looks rad.

The Twenty Systems project combines an audio CD of new music with a full colour 60 page book containing photos and diagrams of the electronic instruments used, along with a detailed history documenting the development of synthesisers between 1968 and 1988.

Dazzle Makeup to foil computer facial recognition.

Plants affect ecology from the bottom up.

Raiding Eternity by Joel Johnson.

Michael Lewis writes about a handful of Wall Street outsiders who realized the subprime mortgage business was a house of cards and found a way to bet against it: Part 1, Part 2.

A team of scientists has succeeded in putting an object large enough to be visible to the naked eye into a mixed quantum state of moving and not moving.

Add MoviePeg to your iPhone, adjust the angle and like magic you’ll be in relaxed viewing heaven.

Phone numbers, shortcuts, tips, contact info, reviews, and customer service details for thousands of companies worldwide.

Unlocking the secrets of Jupiter’s Giant Red Spot.

For the first time, researchers harvest raw electric current directly from algae.

Planet Money on NPR tracks its very own toxic asset.

Get Lamp: The Text Adventure documentary looks interesting.

CB2′s new outdoor collection.

Slate ad critic Seth Stevenson tries out a Google service that allows you to run your own commercial on national TV for as little as $100.

MIDIPad turns your iPad into a multi-touch MIDI controller.

Transportation secretary announces “Sea-Change” for american transport: Bikes!

The sulphur compounds that litter the surface of Mars may contain the signature of life.

Consuming Smarter: Fly less often, eat less red meat and dairy, drive a small car.

The Institute for Human Centered Design store.

NASA finds shrimp-like creature, jellyfish beneath antarctic ice sheet.

Fox Vs Duck micro game app for iPhone/iPod Touch.

Novothink solar surge iPhone & iPod Touch charging case.

Thermopower waves: MIT scientists discover new way to produce electricity.

Obama appoints Edward Tufte to advise on stimulus transparency.

A loot valued at $20 million lies off the coast of Staten Island, and Ken Hayes is on the hunt for the sunken silver bullion.

Demolishing density in Detroit: can farming save the motor city?

Whales, like trees, slow warming.

With artificial photosynthesis, a bottle of water could produce enough energy to power a house.

Books in the age of the iPad.

LastHistory graphs all your Last.fm listening.

Oxygen-enriched booze makes for less-intense hangover.

Trapcode ProLoop is a powerful and flexible loop player for iPhone.

A brief history of monome production.

Physicists look for the arrow of time, biologists find it.

A conversation with Robert Henke: Silence, Technology, and Process.

In Disobedient Rooms: China Miéville On J.G. Ballard.

Osmos For The iPhone Coming.

“On average, bronze medalists are happier than silver medalists.”

Flaunt: Designing effective, compelling and memorable portfolios of creative work. Buy the book or PDF.

The doormat, the jerk and the lizard brain.

Livid Instruments’ new Builder is a line of DIY parts that make it easy for users to design their own USB MIDI control surfaces and devices using buttons, knobs, faders, and talkback LEDs.

Shifting Identities: From Consumer to Networked Creator.

NOBY NOBY BOY for iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad, from the creator of Katamari Damacy.

The Vitesse D7HG is for those who are looking for a great bike for urban commuting at a good value.

Research says users will pay for content online, with a few catches.

Nanoloop For The iPhone.

Philip K. Dick: A ‘plastic’ paradox. Sneak peek at an upcoming Philip K. Dick film, Radio Free Albemuth.

Steven Frank of Panic Software fame, on the next phase of computing.

Quieting the lizard brain.

The “My” water bottle from Stelton.

Researchers in Japan have shown that a slime mold can design a network in a day that is as efficient as one developed by humans over many years: the Tokyo rail system.

Imagine that instead of having just one wireless carrier, your phone would constantly search for the best connection. An algorithm on your smartphone would assess signal strengths, and balance that with roaming costs, and decide when to switch from one carrier to another.

Humor: Laugh at those quirky, Unhappy Hipster (mostly from the pages of Dwell, it seems).

This DIY interface (YouTube) is impressive, but it just seems like buttons and sliders replicated on a touchscreen. I’d like to see such devices make use of true multi-touch gestures, such as pinch/expand, twist/rotate, 2/3/4-finger swipes and so on to control sound. Instead of yet another controller app (e.g. a bigger version of TouchOSC or an affordable Lemur-clone), I’ve been wanting to use musicmaking apps optimized for the mobile experience—perhaps a basic version of Live (incl. Impulse, Simpler and Analog instruments with a handful of essential midi and audio effects) or Propellerheads Rebirth for writing tracks. Something that could work as a standalone audio sketch pad, with the ability to transfer projects to the desktop version for further work. I started putting together a mock-up using screen grabs from Live before coming to a realization:

Rather than merely porting existing software to mobile versions, it’s important to examine the mental models that dominate the desktop. Most of the more popular audio suites are based on the recording studio-in-a box model, where the signals (midi info, audio from guitar, voice, synth, drums, whatever) are fed through a virtual mixing desk, using inline and outboard effects and processors, to be recorded in loops or longer segments before being placed in an arrangement to mix-down and master. Apple’s Logic Studio, Propellerhead’s Reason, Steinberg’s Cubase Studio and others are variations on this mental model.

Ableton Suite is my weapon-of-choice because of its flexible, on-the-fly, semi-modular approach that can be adapted to varying needs: looseness vs. precision, improvisation vs. control, performance vs. planning. Plugins and updates bring new instruments and effects, and endless routing and importing options make Live an audio ourobouros. Max for Live builds on this, with new resources for generating, shaping and routing signals, but Live’s clips>tracks>session>arrangement>mixdown>master>render model is still a largely traditional structure (albeit for me the best-of-all-possible-worlds for composing, performing and recording). Max is another side of this spectrum, where building blocks can be created, changed and arranged as needed in a virtual instrument/studio.

Most of the mobile musicmaking apps I’ve used so far (BeatMaker, 8Bitone, technoBox) shrink this virtual studio to the smaller screen of the iPhone and iPod Touch. They use virtual buttons and sliders for controls, sometimes spanning multiple screens. Several apps, though, show promise for emerging mental models, including SynthPond and Brian Eno’s Bloom and Trope. SynthPond’s affecters, reactors and orbits lend themselves to non-linear, interactive compositions. I imagine it would be a lot of fun to use on the iPad’s larger screen, esp. with new objects for generating, reacting, processing and moving sounds. Eno’s dynamic, generative pieces work well as apps, because they change and evolve rather than remain fixed to a certain textural arrangement on CD or MP3. These apps are systems for composing and generating music/sounds/spaces/moods and point the way for the possibilities of the iPad and beyond. Artists/composers/developers/companies/organizations that rethink the mental models with which we create and experience music will lead the way on these new and future devices.

The reimagined iWork gives a hint of how apps can be optimized for both mobility and multitouch. It would be great to see Boxee develop something for streaming content, from both online channels and via UPnP devices. I’m sure our son would love watching YouTube on it as well.

Initially, I thought the 3G-capable models would appeal only to those who work and travel, but then it occurred to me maybe I wouldn’t need to shell out the big bucks for FiOS at home if we had such a wireless connection, esp. since it’s unlocked and pay-as-you-go. Just a thought.

What I’m most excited about, though, is using an iPad to make music: I can already imagine running iPad-enhanced versions of BeatMaker, 8Bitone, synthPond, technoBox and especially TouchOSC as a multitouch controller. And, dare we dream of a mobile Ableton Live? With the iPad’s larger surface and faster processor, a lite version with virtual instruments Impulse, Simpler, Analog, Tension and a handful of basic effects would make a great audio sketch pad.

The other extreme: low-alcohol beers.

Deep below New York City’s bustling streets lies a dangerous world inhabited by “sandhogs.”

The Rise and Fall of Design Within Reach.

How Robber Barons hijacked the “Victorian Internet”

Robert Henke talks with Rashad Becker about audio mastering.

Apple’s Mistake: An organization that wins by exercising power starts to lose the ability to win by doing better work.

Processing T-shirts 2009/2010.

ABC Oddity iPhone app for toddlers.

What design researchers can learn from hostage negotiators.

Christian Swinehart’s visualizations of Choose Your Own Adventure stories.

Reinventing the MBA: 4 reasons to mix business with design thinking.

Report: 237 millionaires in Congress.

Nutrition-style labels reveal companies’ social responsibility.

Miles Davis: The Complete Columbia Album Collection.

The Botany of Desire: based on the book by Michael Pollan.

The new Nine Inch Nails iPhone App shows that Reznor and crew grok how to connect with fans and build a community around their creative work.

Drobo releases the bigger, better, rack-mounted and faster DroboPro.

Boks is an AIR application that provides a User Interface for Blueprint CSS framework.

I’ve been using Intua BeatMaker for about a week now on my iPod Touch. It works well as a mobile sketchpad for writing simple tracks of beats and patterns. The user interface took some getting used to, as features are split up between Home, Pads, Sequencer and FX screens. There’s a noticeable lag when switching between screens as well. Sample kits and exported audio can be transfered to and from an iPhone or iPod Touch using their file transfer utility BeatPack. It’s easy to drag samples from my computer into a set and then transfer it over, although I had to add the ports (3131) to my Firewall to get a connection. There are two audio effects busses, but the choices are a bit meager: synced delay times are only divisible by 1/4 notes (e.g. no 1/3, 1/6, 1/12), three-band EQ and a simple bit-crusher. I’ve already exported a half dozen sketches for use in Live, so I’ll be posting some of the results in the coming weeks.

UPDATE: here are some sample exports: 001, 002, 003-8-bit, 005-hard (MP3s).

But, I’ve found it’s often better to wait about six months before purchasing any new product line. That way there’s time for any bugs to get fixed and necessary features to be added (not to mention a potential memory bump). I guess I’m a conservative-early-adopter. Still, it seems Apple has once-again reinvigorated a banal marketplace with its design research and expertise. Hats-off to that,