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CBS CEO Les Moonves faces sexual misconduct investigation
The CBS board of directors will investigate allegations of sexual misconduct laid against CEO Les Moonves. The New Yorker published an exposé from investigative reporter Ronan Farrow detailing the accusations of six women who say that between the 80s and mid-aughts, the executive sexually harassed them. Four of them, including the actress Illeana Douglas said they were forcibly touched or kissed during business meetings, while two accused him of employing physical intimidation and threats to derail their careers. The report also contains claims of harassment against other men in the CBS and CBS News divisions, including 60 Minutes executive producer Jeff Fager.
Microsoft attempts to teach computers how to make a funny
Computers and artificial intelligence systems have long struggled with a human understanding of humor – as anyone who has ever asked Siri to tell a joke well knows. Bloomberg reports that recently, a researcher at Microsoft began working with The New Yorker on a project that aims to teach an AI system what is and what is not "funny."
Apple begins marketing the iPhone 5s in magazines
MacRumors tips us off to the fact that Apple has begun advertising the iPhone 5s in various magazines. Up until recently, there hasn't been much advertising in the way of the iPhone 5s. Indeed, most iPhone advertising over the past few weeks has focused on the iPhone 5c with a series of really great and delightful commercials. Apple has also been advertising the iPhone 5c heavily via billboards in large cities like Chicago, San Francisco and New York. As for the 5s, MacRumors notes that the following ad appears on the back of this week's edition of The New Yorker. The tagline reads: Your finger is the password. Touch ID was created not only to protect all the important and personal information on your phone, but to be so easy to use, you'll actually use it. Its state-of-the-art technology learns your unique fingerprint, so you can unlock your phone or even authorize purchases with just a simple touch. Touch ID. Only on iPhone 5s. It stands to reason that with the holiday shopping season slowly creeping up on us, Apple will soon begin to ramp up its iPhone 5s marketing. This is admittedly nothing more than speculation, but perhaps Apple has been slow to roll out iPhone 5s ads because supply continues to remain strained across the country. After all, if you take a look at the fine print in the advert above, you'll note that it says "Limited Availability" -- though perhaps that's in specific reference to the gold model. Similar ads have reportedly been spotted in other high-circulation magazines such as Entertainment Weekly and Sports Illustrated.
The New Yorker unveils Strongbox, a tool for sources to submit files and tips anonymously
As with most news organizations, a lot of the posts we publish start out as emailed tips from you, our dear readers. But some employees put their jobs on the line when they share info, which, as you might imagine, makes them reluctant to hit send. The New Yorker seems to have a solution that'll offer a much higher degree of anonymity, stripping IP addresses and other identifying data whenever you upload a file or submit a tip. You create an alias, and all correspondence takes place within a secure environment, called Strongbox. Best yet, the code for this tool, called DeadDrop, is completely open-source, so you can download the necessary software and implement it on your own site, free of charge. More info on both are available at the source links below.
Wall Street Journal to offer free WiFi hotspots in NYC and San Francisco during September
Oh New Yorkers and their marvelous, no-cost WiFi access points. Only a few days after Google Offers and Boingo happily announced they'd brought gratis wireless connectivity to additional underground locations within the city, The Wall Street Journal is now let it be known it too will be kind enough to gift the NYC crowd with some WiFi hotspots of its own. The nice gesture will bring around 1,300 network units to areas such as SoHo, Greenwich Village, Union Square, Chelsea and, naturally, the renowned Times Square during the month of September -- all in hopes of giving "people the opportunity to sample The Wall Street Journal." Meanwhile, folks in San Francisco can also grab the internet-friendly freebies in a couple of different places, including Nob Hill and Fisherman's Wharf. And don't worry, there won't be any donkeys involved here.
New Yorker iPhone app gets quirky Lena Dunham promo clip
Filmmaker, actress and comedienne Lena Dunham teamed up with Alex Karpovsky and Mad Men's Jon Hamm in an advertisement for The New Yorker magazine's new iPhone app. It's a quirky short that introduces the salient features of the app. You can watch the promo clip in the YouTube video below and let us know what you think in the comments. [Via Deadline] #next_pages_container { width: 5px; hight: 5px; position: absolute; top: -100px; left: -100px; z-index: 2147483647 !important; }
The New Yorker now available on iPhone
If you MUST have The New Yorker available at all times, and you own an iPhone, the now universal app is for you. Subscribers will get the magazine for free after activating a digital subscription. Others will find the August 13 and August 20 issues available as a free preview. In addition to looking great on the iPhone, The New Yorker app offers sharing via Twitter, Facebook and email, a slideshow of the current cartoons, video and audio features, plus infographics that are obviously not part of the printed edition. A one month subscription to the New Yorker is US$5.99 or $59.99 per year. The New Yorker has a great mix of writing on the arts, politics, and life as its writers see it. I know lots of New Yorker fans who will be just thrilled to have this magazine in their pockets.
The New Yorker has sold 20,000 annual paid iPad subscriptions
The New Yorker has sold more than 20,000 annual paid iPad subscriptions since Conde Nast overhauled its iPad magazine strategy in May. 20,000 readers are now subscribed to the annual US$59.99 iPad-only edition of the quintessential news, social, and literary magazine while every week another 5,000 people buy single issues of the magazine for $4.99. While this is good news for Conde Nast, it also reflects heavily on The New Yorker as a magazine and speaks to its digital distribution strategy. Of all Conde Nast's iPad magazines, The New Yorker has achieved the highest subscription rates by eschewing the interactive and sometimes annoying eye-candy content and navigation other digital magazines have been using in their apps. As The New York Times points out, "The New Yorker, a magazine that has always been heavy on text, took a different tack from its peers. Instead of loading its iPad app with interactive features, the magazine focused on presenting its articles in a clean, readable format." In other words, even on a device like the iPad, the content and skilled editorial decisions of a magazine seem to matter more than distracting visual flair like page curls, flips, and transitions. Pamela Maffei McCarthy, The New Yorker's deputy editor, told The New York Times, "That was really important to us: to create an app all about reading. There are some bells and whistles, but we're very careful about that. We think about whether or not they add any value. And if they don't, out the window they go." Good advice.
Shigeru Miyamoto profiled: legendary game designer, interior decorating enthusiast
Using traditional conversion metrics, The New Yorker's got ten pictures worth of words on Nintendo's iconic designer Shigeru Miyamoto, arguably the father of modern video games whose cerebral impulses have spawned the likes of Mario and Legend of Zelda. Don't expect any bombshell news (spoiler: the company's hard at work on a portable, glasses-free 3D console), but it's definitely a thorough and entertaining read on the origins of Nintendo's gaming interests and Miyamoto himself. Bonus: given how Miyamoto's non-work time with exercise and gardening became the inspiration for WiiFit and Pikmin, feel free to overanalyze how his fixation with moving around his living room will turn into the next multi-platinum title.
Penny Arcade made a comic with the iPad
Most people seem to agree the iPad is a pretty great device for reading (although perhaps not the best, eh Amazon?). However, the debate still rages on about how suitable it is for making stuff. When it was first announced, there was plenty of snark from bloggers like Paul Thurrott, who wrote: "When you go out and about with just an iPad, you're sending a message that you're not going to contribute. You're just there to consume." Obviously, we beg to disagree, and not because we're a pro-Apple site. It's probably fair to say that, despite comprehensive tools like iWork, a variety of just-give-me-my-text editors like myTexts, and even folding portable keyboards, the list of people writing novels on the iPad is probably fairly small. But I use my iPad for making notes and drafting blog posts more often than I use any other single computer. It's small, neat, has great battery life, and does a superb job of not interrupting or distracting me. But text entry, which is admittedly compromised by the iPad's touchscreen keyboard, is only part of the story. The iOS App Store sports a dizzying array of music apps, for example; there's even a complete multi-instrument, iPad-only recreation of "Eye of the Tiger." And there is a wide range of graphics apps too, which have been used to create things like these stunning pieces of artwork and a New Yorker cover that was made with an iPhone. All of these things do have a slight proof of concept air about them, though; there's just a little whiff of "I made this with the iPad because I could." That's why I was impressed in a different way when I read yesterday's strip by popular gaming webcomic Penny Arcade and the accompanying text article by artist Mike Krahulik: "So I am home sick today and that's why the strip looks a little strange. I was trying to figure out a way to draw the comic from home what with all my stuff being at the office. I remembered that I had downloaded the Sketchbook Pro app on my iPad. So today's comic was drawn entirely with my pointer finger. Kiko was kind enough to drop my finger paintings into the panels and add the text for me." What impressed me was that this wasn't art made for the sake of making art with an iPad; this was the iPad being used more routinely to make art that wasn't, in any obvious way, different from the artist's usual style. This is iOS content creation becoming normal rather than extraordinary. And that feels really exciting to me.
AT&T making tourists even more annoying with free Times Square WiFi
AT&T's master plan to relieve 3G data congestion in New York City? Give the crush of upward-facing tourists in Times Square free WiFi. AT&T will announce its first ever free outdoor WiFi hotspot later today located at the north central part of Times Square, near 7th Avenue between 45th and 47th Street. Qualifying AT&T customers with smartphones like the iPhone will automatically switch from 3G data to WiFi when in range. Great, just what Times Square needs: smartphone wielding pedestrians enticed by fast data to be even more oblivious to the pace of busy New Yorkers. If successful, AT&T will add WiFi hotspots to other high-traffic areas... and hopefully help push through tourist-lane legislation that could solve NYC's real congestion problems. [Photo courtesy of MarkArms]
Adobe releases Adobe Ideas for iPad
Just because Adobe can't have Flash on the iPad doesn't mean that they want to miss out on the Apple tablet bandwagon. Adobe has released a pretty cool app called Adobe Ideas. Adobe Ideas is a sketchbook for the iPad. The app features vector-based drawing tools, zoom control, sizable brushes, layers, and the ability to email PDF documents for editing in Adobe Illustrator and Photoshop. While Adobe Ideas isn't as feature-rich as Brushes for iPad, it is a free app that starving artists will appreciate (though, if you've bought an iPad, I don't think you technically count as a "starving" artist). Brushes for iPhone was used by Jorge Colombo to paint a cover of The New Yorker. It's going to be cool to see how artists start embracing the iPad and its larger screen with apps like these. Picasso may have had his Moleskine (may have), but the next great artists might just be sketching their budding visions on the iPad.
Conde Nast stakes out 'leadership position' on iPad
This isn't the 80s anymore. It's not good enough to just pump out lusty hardware like the Walkman in order to drive generous profit streams. In the modern age of consumer electronics, it takes content and an entire ecosystem of software and services to keep customers locked in and buying your gear. That's why we're paying close attention to content deals for the suddenly hot tablet category of devices. Conde Nast has been teasing custom content for next generation tablets for months, lead by mock-ups of its Wired magazine property. So it's no surprise to hear Charles H. Townsend, president and CEO of Conde Nast say he wants to "take a leadership position," on Apple's iPad. According to the New York Times, the company will announce plans today (via an internal company memo) for its first custom iPad digital pubs: the April issue of GQ (there's already an iPhone app for that), followed by the June issues of Wired and Vanity Fair, and then The New Yorker and Glamour sometime in the summer. This first cut represents a broad swath of demographics as Conde Nast trials Apple's newest platform in order to see what works. We should also expect a variety of prices and advertising models during the initial experimentation period. Also noteworthy is Conde Nast's two-track development approach: the iPad version of Wired will be developed with Adobe (as we heard) but the others will be developed internally -- all the digital mags will be available via iTunes although Wired will also be made available in "non-iTunes formats." Assuming it finds a model that works, then Conde Nast plans to digitize other magazines in the fall.
iPhone-generated artwork featured on cover of The New Yorker
Well, what do you know? It looks like our favorite fingerpainter is really making a name for himself with his handset artwork. Like his other New York City-scapes, Jorge Colombo's cover for the June 1, 2009 issue of The New Yorker was composed entirely in the Brushes iPhone app. And it looks like the artist's switch to a digital format is no gimmick -- he tells The New York Times that the device allows him to work "without having to carry all my pens and brushes and notepads with me." And he can work in anonymity -- to complete the cover he spent about an hour on 42nd Street, with no interruptions (try doing that with a canvas, an easel, and a full compliment of art supplies). Mr. Colombo, if you're out there: we'd like to add you to our Mafia Wars family. Drop us an email.
Lots of mentions in the New Yorker's Mossberg profile
Not that we'd want to steal the show from the inimitable Walt Mossberg, but we were pretty stoked to see ourselves up in lights in the New Yorker's profile written by none other than Ken Auletta. (Even Engadget commenter Dermot81 got a shoutout in the profile.) Here are a few clips from our mentions:"On January 9th, when, at the annual MacWorld conference, Steve Jobs, the C.E.O. of Apple, offered the first glimpse of Apple's forthcoming iPhone, a combination cell phone and music player, the blog Engadget.com had more traffic than the Times' Web site.""Bloggers have taken note of [Mossberg getting Apple products early]. A comment posted in April on Engadget, by Dermot81, read, 'Mossberg may be the biggest Apple fanboy on the face of the planet, so I'd take any review he does of an Apple product with a grain of salt.'""Of the blogs that review products, Engadget, now owned by AOL, has the biggest audience; it gets about eight million unique visitors per month. It also has its own office, six hundred square feet on the top floor of a five-story walkup on Allen Street, on the Lower East Side, which doubles as the apartment of Peter Rojas, its founder. Three P.C.s are on his desk, and one of his windows frames the Empire State Building, several miles uptown. Rojas, who just turned thirty-two, studied at Harvard and got a master's degree in English literature from the University of Sussex, in England; like Mossberg, he started as a print journalist, freelancing for various publications. Also like Mossberg, Rojas accepts no gifts and no junkets, and returns the products that he tests. 'The only asset you have to differentiate yourself from competitors is your credibility,' he says. A corner of his apartment is piled with FedEx boxes. Rojas estimates that he has written more than six thousand posts for Engadget, and another four thousand for his previous blog, Gizmodo. A Mossberg column runs about nine hundred words; posts written by Rojas, three full-time employees, and paid freelancers average between fifty and a hundred and fifty words. With the reviews he wrote for publications, Rojas says, 'you kind of had to water it down and assume the audience didn't really care about what you write about and you had to 'hook' them into the article. What I realized about blogging is you're not going to read a blog about gadgets unless you're really interested in gadgets. I assume that our readers know that Sprint and Verizon are CDMA networks, and that T-Mobile and A.T.&T./Cingular are GSM networks.' And by "writing up," he adds, 'the higher we aim the more it grows, because the audience responds to that.' Rojas says that what Mossberg does 'is great, because he is able to translate for an audience that may not care, whereas I write for an audience that already cares.' Mossberg says that he has respect for Engadget, but, "like so many of the tech or gadget Web sites, it is more of a product-alert system, mostly printing descriptions, albeit with attitude. It really doesn't do hands-on reviews."This isn't the first time Monsieur Mossberg and Engadget have crossed paths, and we're hoping it won't be the last. Here's to you, Unkie Walt.
Nintendo makes third place cool
We don't often speak of real competition around here -- that is, competition with Microsoft and Sony. There are a lot of reasons for this; after all, Nintendo themselves claim (quite rightly) that when it comes to this market, they're not competing with the other guys. They're looking to do something new.But the fact remains that for a while, Nintendo has been in third place when it comes to the console wars. Is that really so bad? According to the New Yorker, when you're Nintendo and the other guys are bleeding money, it's just fine to come in last. We know, it seems strange on the face, but once examined, it makes sense. Without the pressure of out-processing and out-performing the other guys when it comes to power, graphics, and sound, Nintendo is free to do whatever they want -- and that shows in the Wii. We don't mean just in the innovative turn the system design took, either. It means Nintendo is free to wield their money where it counts, and in return, they reap the reward of profiting on every system that sells. We've heard most of this before, but rarely in a context that compares the video game industry to other businesses. The New Yorker draws a comparison to car companies by posing the question of who one would rather be in that market: GM or Honda? The choice is easy. Staying near the top is a benefit when it comes to making and selling cars. But the business of games doesn't seem to follow all the same rules -- and it's interesting to look at what's going on in the industry from that perspective.So what does that mean will happen if Nintendo continues the roll they're on with the Wii and the DS and catapults back into the spotlight as the biggest and baddest of all? Will their profitability slip? Or is Nintendo just the best business model gaming has to offer, regardless of the standings between the big three?
The New Yorker on Will Wright (in 10,000 words or less)
Will Wright is the ultimate spokesperson for gaming. The same way Bill Gates made being a nerd not only acceptable, but desirable, Wright embodies everything that can be great about video games. Writers find in him a sort of mad scientist, with an impish grin and a clever streak running through him a mile long (he's done the calculations to determine how many stars have received radio broadcasts of The Dukes of Hazzard). He's the "god of God games," an innovator, a risk-taker, a rainmaker. He's a "genius," with the backstory and the charisma to make it palatable to the masses. And that's who his story is being told to.Rarely do we see the sort of long thoughtful hagiography in the enthusiast press that we often find about Wright in the mainstream press. A recent New York Times Magazine piece revered him as "the most famous and most critically acclaimed designer in the young medium's history." This week's The New Yorker dedicates an incredible 10,000 words to the "game master," covering everything from the history of Electronic Arts to panspermia to his affinity for dueling robots (seriously) to the negative impressions of video games that Wright himself, as a personality, does so much to disassemble. How much can you really criticize a game whose primary influence is the convergence of Drake's equation and The Powers of Ten?And that's why every time Wright is put on a pedestal -- as a creator, as an artist, and as a genius -- it advances the acceptance and appreciation of video games far more rapidly than the industry's ballooning profits ever have. [Thanks, Andrew]
