David Lidsky's Blog, page 2883
September 25, 2015
Chess Deconstructed: Inside The Saul Bass Tribute-Turned-Video Game
NotDoba is an addictive little game that looks and sounds like a Saul Bass credit sequence come to life.
The legendary Saul Bass was one of the most influential graphic designers of the 20th century, lending his unique unique vision to everything from corporate logos to motion picture title sequences. About the only thing the man didn't design during his career was video game. Now, thanks to NotDoba, you can now get an idea of what that would be like: it's a fun, frantic indie game that plays like a Saul Bass title sequence brought to life.
September 24, 2015
Kickstarter Nixes Unlimited Vacation Time For Employees
Unlimited vacation, it seems, encouraged Kickstarter employees not to go on vacation.
Kickstarter employees are losing what appears to be a perk at first glance: unlimited vacation days. The crowdfunding startup recently changed its flexible vacation policy, according to BuzzFeed News. A Kickstarter spokesperson told BuzzFeed News that the company is now capping vacation time at a (still generous) 25 days a year. In making the decision, Kickstarter cited the need for clearer guidelines on how to better separate work time from personal time.
The iPhone's Ad-Blocking Apps Are Stirring Up Trouble For Online Retailers
Crystal, a popular ad-blocking app for the iPhone, is allegedly obstructing images and text on retail sites like Sears.com.
Since the release of iOS 9, which supports ad blockers, a number of apps that obstruct ads have made their way into the App Store. The use of these apps on iPhones, in particular, appears to be compromising the mobile sites of retailers like Walmart and Sears—and could potentially hinder online sales in the coming months.
Today in Tabs: Why Tabs Exists
There's room for everyone in the Takeswagen.
It takes three to trango
Samsung's New Gear VR Headset Will Only Cost $99
The virtual reality headset, which plugs into any of Samsung's 2015 smartphones, is being positioned as a big holiday seller.
Samsung is gearing up for the holiday shopping season with a new, affordable toy for virtual reality enthusiasts. The company just announced its new Gear VR, a lightweight Oculus-powered virtual reality headset that will cost just $99. The earlier version of Gear VR came out last year; this iteration will retail for half the price and is 20% lighter. It can also plug into any of the smartphones Samsung released this year, including the Galaxy Note 5, Galaxy S6 Edge+, Galaxy S6, and Galaxy S6 Edge models.
20th Century Fox First Major Hollywood Studio To Release Full-Length Films On Oculus
The studio is releasing 100 movies, including hits like Birdman, Alien, and Die Hard for Oculus Video users to rent or buy.
Oculus's virtual reality cinema has not only been given a new name—say hello to Oculus Video—but it has scored its first major Hollywood studio partnership with the announcement that 20th Century Fox will make its movies available on the new platform.
The First Xiaomi Laptop Threatens Apple In China
Apple's most formidable rival in China, Xiaomi, is expanding from smartphones to affordable laptops.
Xiaomi, the Chinese smartphone manufacturer, is competing with Apple on yet another front, by creating its first laptop. According to the Taipei Times, hardware firm Inventec will be making the device, which is set to ship within the first six months of 2016. The news confirms a Bloomberg report from earlier this month, which said Xiaomi was "considering the introduction of its first laptop."
This New Platform Makes The Contents Of Videos As Searchable As Text
A website by video analysis startup Dextro tags Twitter videos by the images and speech they contain.
If you want to find videos of Pope Francis during his visit to the U.S. this week, you might search Twitter or Facebook for "Pope" or "Pope speech." But those search terms will leave out videos that are captioned with non-obvious text, like "Omg amazing!" or "#blessed."
The Pachinko Machine Of Your Probable Death
Nathan Yau's life expectancy simulator makes one thing clear: don't book plans after 80.
Thanks to humanity's endless fascination with mortality, there's no shortage of tools out there that will predict how much longer you've got to live. But according to FlowingData's Nathan Yau, all these death calculators have the same fundamental problem: they're all based on the average of everyone doing the dying. There's a lot of luck involved in whether you live another 50 years, or just five. How do you calculate that, let alone visualize it?
Yes, This GIF Takes 1,000 Years To Loop
Counting from 1 to 48,140,288, this GIF needs a home for the next millenia.
GIFs are designed to loop short clips—generally a couple seconds long—over and over until you close your browser window. But As Long As Possible is a different kind of GIF; one rendered on a geologic time scale. Created by Helsinki-based artists Juha van Ingen and Janne Särkelä, it's designed to loop only once every thousand years.
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