David Lidsky's Blog, page 3165
September 20, 2014
The First 100 Days Of ClickHole: How Creativity (And George Takei) Keep The Onion-Y Site Sizzling
There's a reason everyone you know is obsessed with the quirky site that makes content parodying viral content--and then makes it go viral.
Getting George Takei to share something you made with his 7 million Facebook followers is like crushing a piñata filled with free pageviews. It's a huge traffic boon for any publisher. And yet, somehow, the Onion's new parody site, ClickHole, managed to win the Takei lottery this week with an article that also happened to rip his science/nerd schtick to shreds.
September 19, 2014
Glitch-Face Is The New Selfie
Mobile self-portraiture for art and security.
The omnipresent "selfie" has some pretty particular, pretty annoying visual characteristics. We've grown accustomed to the unnatural 45-degree angle that thins the face and exaggerates the eyes (which are usually eerily deadpan, focused on maneuvering into the aforementioned thinning angle). Selfie aficionados know their most flattering and flattening Instagram filter. It's not just a self-portrait, it's an avatar, a self-made and self-modified icon, and it's not particularly realistic.
The Recommender: Futuristic Space-Age Hip Hop And Photo Gear With Maja Saphir
The best things on the Internet this week, curated by Fast Company employees.
Maja Saphir Name: Maja Saphir
Role at Fast Company: Web Photo Editor
Twitter: @MYCS7
Titillating Fact: I am a Chicago native. I was adopted at 5 weeks old. My mother's family is Swedish and Croatian, which is why I have the "j" in my name. My father's family is from Vienna, Austria, and Illinois. My great grandfather on my dad's side, Julius Hess, is the inventor of the early incubator for infants at Michael Reese Hospital. It was called the Hess Bed. In the '60s, after he died, The Smithsonian visited the hospital to collect the incubator for their archives and an exhibit, but at the time, they had difficulty finding it because the nursery ward had been using it as a flower pot.
YouTube Invests Millions To Keep Its Top Stars Home
New plans include a shift in payment strategy, new video formatting, and partnerships with Hollywood producers.
YouTube wants to retain its stable of digital stars and is planning to invest millions of dollars to do so. The video-sharing website is pursuing new deals that would pay popular content creators--like Fast Company cover woman Bethany Mota--to create shows that will come with promotional guarantees and the possibility of working with Hollywood producers, Re/code reports.
Alibaba Soars In Largest IPO In U.S. History
Founder Jack Ma now stands as China's richest man with an estimated net worth of $21.9 billion.
Alibaba made its debut Friday on the New York Stock Exchange as the largest initial public offering in U.S history.
Why Businessweek's Ugly Tim Cook Cover Is Subversive Genius
It's impossible to design a cover that makes someone look like this much of a clown by accident.
To say that the design of Bloomberg Businessweek's latest cover has raised eyebrows is to underestimate the ability of human eyebrows to literally rip themselves off of the skull to which they are attached.
Three Reasons Apple Pay Is Going To Work
Two of Apple's inaugural Apple Pay partners tell us what it's like working with the tech giant.
This story contains interviews with Barry McCarthy, president of Financial Services at FirstData; a Chase Bank representative with knowledge of Apple's Apple Pay plans; and Brett King, CEO of Moven.
Google Passed Its Nevada Driving Test With Flying Colors--And Control Of The Road Conditions
DMV logs obtained by IEEE Spectrum suggest a slightly more complicated story.
Google's self-driving cars are adorable as hell. And for all the good they'll one day do for our congested roadways, the vehicles, which have logged more than 700,000 miles, might not be ready for commercial use anytime soon. Currently, the only governing body to have tested the vehicles on open roads is the Nevada Department of Motor Vehicles in May 2012. The tricked-out Toyota Prius passed the DMV's test, no problem.
4 Young Designers To Watch
These designers-in-residence at the Design Museum are shaking up everything from public housing to monetary policy.
Designer Ilona Gaynor once planned a Hollywood-worthy heist at five Los Angeles banks, combining fact, fiction, and suspense to create art focused on exposing the judicial system's absurdities. Now she's exploring that same theme of "disrupting the law" during a six-month residency at London's Design Museum, where her latest project opened to the public last week. Like the interactive L.A. heist, this installation involves visitors in a whodunit case rife with loopholes, twists, and turns.
A New Startup Finds Money in Email Bounce-Backs
Do you open a message that has bounced back? A shocking number of us do, which is why there's treasure in that virtual trash
Every email inbox is a minefield.
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