David Lidsky's Blog, page 4578

Tesla/PayPal Founder Elon Musk Defends His Finances, Personal Life

Some background: Elon Musk founded both PayPal and Tesla, the former of which was a massive financial windfall. The entrepreneur is also a major player in SpaceX, a private space exploration company that is to figure heavily in President Obama's new NASA program. Musk has become a significant celebrity in Silicon Valley as a result.

A series of pieces, largely from VentureBeat and published over the last month or two, accused Musk of being "out of cash," putting Tesla (and possibly SpaceX) at...

Rumor: Apple Wants to Offer 99-Cent Streaming TV Episode Rentals

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A rumor from Ryan Lawler over at NewTeeVee asserts that "according to sources," Apple is pushing content providers to allow a new streaming TV episode rental service for iTunes.

Right now, iTunes sells individual TV episodes for either $1.99 (standard-def) or $2.99 (high-def), and those episodes are downloaded, rather than streamed. Downloading episodes takes both time and storage space, especially for HD content--one 44-minute episode in HD (hour-long dramas, for example) can total over 1GB...

Double Rainbow Guy on Viral Videos, the Influence Project, and WHAT IT MEANS

"WHAT DOES IT MEAN?" cried YouTube-sensation Double Rainbow guy, whose trippy experience witnessing a pair of colorful streaks in the sky caught fire on the Web recently, and amassed more than 1.5 million views. Indeed, what does it mean? For Double Rainbow guy, aka Paul Vasquez (the "Yosemitebear Mountain Giant"), it was the bedazzling wonderment of dual rainbows that provoked the question.

Here at Fast Company, we're more interested in figuring out what it means for the clip to have...

Designers: Stop Armchair Quarterbacking. Play The Damn Game

As a naturalized American the 4th of July is an opportunity for me to reflect about this great country. As a designer I noticed a few media streams that have come together to paint an interesting picture--a picture that should be talked about in design circles just as much as any new trend or eco-philosophy.

"The things we make, make us" is the new tag line of a visceral Jeep ad campaign, recalling a country that used to "make things." Andy Grove, Intel's legendary ex-CEO, wrote a

Facebook Acquires Local Recommendations and Guide Service NextStop

[image error]In a blog post, NextStop announced today that they've been acquired by Facebook. NextStop is a service that lets users create and browse through local guides, a bit like a more personalized and non-centrally-edited WikiTravel.

The service had gotten a nice little bit of buzz from the startup community, and in the past couple months had actually issued a few fairly major updates. But to the likely chagrin of NextStop's users, Facebook will be actively shutting it down come September 1st.

It...

Designers: Stop Armchair Quarterbacking. Play The Damn Game

Why is thinking about a problem more highly regarded than getting in and solving it?

 

As a naturalized American the 4th of July is an opportunity for me to reflect about this great country. As a designer I noticed a few media streams that have come together to paint an interesting picture--a picture that should be talked about in design circles just as much as any new trend or eco-philosophy.

"The things we make, make us" is the new tag line of a visceral Jeep ad campaign, recalling a...

Mobile Biofuel Processor Can Rove the Midwest In Search of Quality Biofuel

Almost any kind of raw biomass can be turned into biofuel, but it's not always cheap--transporting raw biomass to a processing facility is significantly more expensive than transporting liquid fuel derived from that biomass. So while it sounds great in theory to turn wood chips from some remote Midwestern farm into biofuel, it doesn't make much sense if the farm is far away from a processing plant. Enter Purdue University's mobile biofuel processing technology, which can turn nearly any...

2010: Apple's Golden Year, If It Doesn't Become Evil

The arrival of the paradigm-defining iPad, the best iPhone to date, and strong rumors of a renewed entry into the digital TV market, 2010 may be Apple's best year ever. May be. Because Apple has serious issues to tackle.

70% Growth is a Golden Age marker

A special report at AppleInsider digs into Apple's recent and historical financial details, and shows how its business operations are converting into raw profits. The facts of Apple's recent successes are well known--its stock market value...

Should Sea Otters Count for Carbon Credits?

Should we be rewarded for shooting ourselves in the foot and then backtracking? Apparently so, at least when it comes to carbon credits. Sea otters, a species that almost went extinct due to fur hunting in the 18th and 19th centuries, could be worth over $700 million in carbon credits if they are restored to healthy populations, according to New Scientist.

The recent decline in the sea otter population admittedly has little to do with humans--the growing killer whale population is thought to...

Hulu CEO Is "Not Averse" to an Even Pricier Ad-Free Subscription

Hulu's new Hulu Plus premium service has garnered praise, sure, but also criticism for continuing to show ads even to those who are already paying. Hulu Plus gives subscribers access to a larger back catalog of shows as
well as the ability to watch them on mobile devices like the Apple
iPhone--but retains ads. Services like Netflix that are, if not direct competitors, certainly in the same broad category, charge monthly fees but have no ads. How does Hulu feel about the reaction to its new...