Media

Anthony Weiner gets a new handle on Twitter

On balance, there may be worse things in life than sending someone pictures of yourself in your underpants.

However, there may be fewer more ill-advised things, especially if you've never met the recipient and you happen to be a politician held in some regard.

For his intimately twittered transgression, Anthony Weiner paid a certain price and that price was what, in some media, is defined by the word "disgrace." It seems odd that this word might be damning, as it is one so often used to describe politicians.

Some might have imagined that Weiner would seek a quieter, more contemplative life after events which saw the Democratic Representative for New York resign in 2011 for his socially networked unseemliness.

A decent amount of time has passed, however, and Weiner seems to be girding his loins for a run at the mayor's office. With this perhaps in mind, he has returned again to the place of alleged disgrace, Twitter. … Read more

Netflix shares explode as revenue tops $1 billion

Bulls and bears will continue to argue about the fair price of its stock, but Netflix's surprisingly good first-quarter earnings report should put paid to the contention that this company's fundamentals are built on a house of cards.

Netflix on Monday posted adjusted earnings per share of 31 cents. Revenue was $1.02 billion. Wall Street expected slightly more than $1 billion in revenue and earnings of 18 cents to 19 cents a share. A year ago during the same quarter, the company lost $5 million, or 8 cents a share, on revenue of $870 million.

The company … Read more

Toddlers need treatment for iPad addiction?

I understand that one of the main joys of parenting a toddler involves keeping the little one amused.

Amused, as in quiet.

Ever since the iPad came along, with its bright colors and infinite range of games and pictures, it has seemed like an ideal tool to keep baby happy. This happiness, however, is one that baby does not want to ever, ever stop. So much so that some toddlers are now said to be iPad addicts.

This curiously adult affliction seems to involve baby undergoing seven aspects of demented ranting, should her iPad be taken away.… Read more

Twitter partners with Comedy Central to host laugh fest

If you've got time for quick joke, Twitter will be the place to be next week.

While there there's already plenty to laugh at on Twitter, the microblogging site is partnering with Comedy Central on a five-day laugh festival that will occur almost entirely on Twitter, according to The New York Times. Comedy legends such as Mel Brooks and Carl Reiner will be joined by young comics in tweeting jokes and posting video clips on Vine, the app Twitter launched in January that allows users to share six-second video clips.

Utilizing Vine's brevity, comedian Steve Agee will … Read more

Facial-recognition tech played no role in ID'ing bomb suspects

While surveillance video provided key images of the men suspected of planting bombs at the Boston Marathon, police use of facial-recognition software proved unhelpful in revealing their identities.

Despite several images of Tamerlan and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev from the scene of the deadly bombings and the existence of images of the brothers in official government databases, facial-recognition software was unable to put names to their faces, Boston Police Commissioner Edward Davis told the Washington Post in an interview published Saturday. Dzhokhar Tsarnaev has a Massachusetts driver's license, while Tamerlan Tsarnaev, the elder brother who died Friday after a shootout with … Read more

Google doodle honors eccentric photographer Norman Parkinson

It seems so obvious now, but taking pictures of models outside of a studio was something of a revolution in the 1940s and 50s.

For Norman Parkinson, the British photographer who would have been 100 years old today, it offered an opportunity for an additional elegance and simplicity.

"I never work in studios if I can help it, because working in a studio is such hard work," he told one interviewer.

A studio is merely an attempt to simulate daylight. Why not just plump for daylight in the first place?

Many think of Sir Norman (as he became) … Read more

Will Samsung's next phone be metal like the iPhone?

There's something about the plastic nature of Samsung's phones that make them slightly less attractive.

To me, that is.

I know that there are millions to whom it doesn't make a difference. There are even many, no doubt, who believe -- in some idiosyncratic way -- that plastic says now, rather than, oh, six months ago.

Some of these people are 13 years old.

However, not all of these people work for Samsung. Indeed, the SamMobile blog last week revealed that it had heard whispers from South Korea that some at Samsung believe plastic isn't quite … Read more

Purported TV-caption slipup pegs Zooey Deschanel as alleged Boston bomber

In a week of more news than seemingly could be printed, the media garlanded itself in praise.

The outside world, however, was troubled by some of the media's rather impulsive excesses -- which were not entirely confined to the New York Post.

Amid the pressure to give the insatiable public what it wanted -- more insatiability -- mistakes were made.

Perhaps the most bizarre may have been perpetrated by someone (or some auto-correct machine) at a Fox affiliate, at least if a picture posted to Twitter is to be believed.

Closed captioning isn't an always easy business. Those … Read more

Yahoo tries to freshen up, kills a bunch of products

Yahoo is doing some spring cleaning. The company announced its plans on Friday to shut down several products, including Yahoo Deals, Yahoo SMS Alerts, and the Yahoo Mail and Messenger apps used on feature phones.

It's all about getting rid of the old to make room for the new, according to Jay Rossiter, Yahoo's executive vice president in charge of platforms, who wrote about the changes in a blog entry.

"We want to bring you experiences that inspire and entertain you every day," Rossiter wrote. "That means taking a hard look at all of our … Read more

Who's to blame when a driverless car goes astray?

If you rob a bank and get away in a driverless Prius, will the owner be indicted as the driver? Or will Toyota? Or maybe Google?

If your driverless car decides -- as so many machines do in movies -- that it has a mind of its own, will you be responsible when it decides to mount the curb and plow straight into your favorite donut store? And what if someone hacks into your driverless car and you suddenly end up in Alaska, with an instruction to mow down moose?

You'll tell me this will never happen. I will point you to the fine profits regularly earned by the world's insurance companies.

I suspect that not everyone has the answers yet for all the ramifications of ceding your steering wheel to Google's machines.

Thankfully, though, all those who have the deepest knowledge of the self-driving future will be meeting in June to have a freewheeling exchange.… Read more