no cure for curiosity.

theatlantic:

Why Should Books Still Be Books When They’re on Tablets?

For all the disruption in the publishing industry wrought by the Internet, e-readers, and tablets, reading a book still feels like, well, reading a book: tabbing through pages, digesting information linearly. But maybe that will change. The company Semi-Linear is hoping so: Its recently unveiled Citia iPad apps reinvents long-form non-fiction for the tablet, turning books into something that resembles less a sequence of chapters and more a digital spread of sharable, customizable, collectible cards.

Read more. [Image: Semi-Linear]

Very interesting concept.

fastcompany:

Watch This Ingenious UI Idea, For Dragging Files From Your Phone To Computer

npr:

futurejournalismproject:

What Happens in an Internet Minute

Via Intel:

In just one minute, more than 204 million emails are sent. Amazon rings up about $83,000 in sales. Around 20 million photos are viewed and 3,000 uploaded on Flickr. At least 6 million Facebook pages are viewed around the world. And more than 61,000 hours of music are played on Pandora while more than 1.3 million video clips are watched on YouTube.

All in all, that’s 625 terabytes of information sloshing about the tubes each minute.

Whoa. That is all. Whoa. -Savy

newyorker:

Good Things About Twitter

One of the most felicitous uses of Twitter is to promote long-form nonfiction by circulating a blurb leading to the full text. Since the practice started, people have shared current long magazine and newspaper pieces and dusted off archival ones. Now organizations like @longform and @longreads and @TheByliner work specifically to find and share excellent pieces that stretch up to three thousand words and beyond. Before Twitter, I was reading half as much extended nonfiction and fiction as I do now on the iPhone or iPad, using apps like Readability and Instapaper.

Two pernicious fallacies embedded in criticism of Twitter—and, by extension, blogs, tumblrs, and GIFs of catbots who kill with laser eyes—are that non-traditional forms of expression can wipe out existing ones, and that these forms are somehow impoverished. The variables unique to the Internet—hyperlinks, GIFs, chat, comments—have enabled new writing voices with their own distinct syntaxes. But we are not dealing with fungible goods—the new forms will never push out older ones because they’re insufficiently similar. You might overdose on unicorn GIFs and go to bed too tired to read “Freedom,” but unicorn GIFs will never replace “Freedom.”

- Sasha Frere-Jones on the good things about Twitter: http://nyr.kr/GG6KH6

theatlantic:

Use Google? Time to Get Real About Protecting Your Digital Self

Google’s decided to integrate the data it has about you, which means you better think about the digital tracks you’re leaving. Read more.

[Image: Alexis Madrigal]

curiositycounts:

Jon Horvath uses GPS to replicate Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, exploring “the (dis)connection between Kerouac’s era and my present day as it pertains to spontaneous acts and the sensation of freedom.” More imaginative Kerouac visualizations.  (via)

laughingsquid:

Cyber Bullying

I really do not think this is accurate and makes light of a prevalent and serious problem. Cyber bullying is a serious issue - not just for kids but for bloggers from all walks of life. There are some seriously scary groups of harassers out there, from kids who say “dick-ish things” to other kids (and then said victims committing suicide & bullies receive no punishment) to websites offering bounty for names, addresses, and information of women feminists (and acknowledge that the information could potentially be used for harm).

Guys, this IS AN ISSUE. Instead of poking fun at it, let’s think of ways we can help.