A few weeks ago, Jay-Z released the song “D.O.A. (Death of Auto-Tune),” much to the delight of some corners of the Internet. It’s basically a song that rails against the proliferation of Auto-Tune, software that can alter/correct the pitch of someone’s voice. Its most notorious use is to make the singer sound like a robot, thus hiding their inability to sing at all. It’s huge in hip-hop, for… → Read More
So it looks like the hot, new trend is to buy the name of old peer-to-peer applications, then “resurrect” said application. Such is the case with Kazaa, which was the biggest P2P application in the post-Napster extravaganza of the early 2000s. Anyhow, someone out there plans to bring Kazaa back—legally, of course. → Read More
Here’s a quick tip for you Mac users who are going to be downloading Firefox 3.5 today. Give this optimized version, named Shiretoko, a try. It’s only for Intel Macs, but it’s supposed to speed up boot time and whatnot. I don’t know, I use it (along with this icon pack) and, all things being equal, I think it works just swell. So give it a shot! → Read More
Well this ought to be of some use to our Chinese readers. And by that I mean people who are actually in China who visit, for whatever reason, crunch gear dot com. There’s some sort of software called Green Dam that will be required on all Chinese PCs soon that blocks all sorts of fun content from being downloaded and/or viewed. Salty political talk? Banned. Pornography? Banned. (Well that’s 90… → Read More
“Oh, FFS!” That’s what the likes of Norton and Symantec can be heard saying today with the news that Microsoft plans to release free anti-virus software, code-named Morro. (That’s the name of a beach in São Paulo, and is pronounced “MO hoo. Tell your friends.) A beta is expected “soon,” but Microsoft hasn’t said when the final version will be available → Read More
Panic, the maker of shockingly good Mac software, is having itself a nice little sale that you may want to take advantage of. From now until 11:59 PM PDT on May 29 (so, a little over a day) you can buy Transmist, Coda, Candy Bar and Unison for 50 percent off. → Read More
Here’s a random software recommendation for your Friday afternoon enjoyment. It’s Vox, it’s for Mac OS X, and it’s a lightweight music player. No, it’s not going to replace iTunes on your system—there’s no library feature, for one thing—but it’ll play some of the more obscure formats out there. → Read More
If you’ve never worked in an office where an unsuspecting co-worker gets an e-mail sent out on his or her behalf announcing that happy hour drinks are on the house, you haven’t LIVED! It’s the perfect way to teach someone that they should always, always, lock their computer whenever they head over to the break room to find that someone drank all the coffee and didn’t bother to make another pot. → Read More
Battery from Native Instruments is a great piece of software. It’s a software sampler for drums and percussion with more than 12 GB of samples. Now you can get it for $99 and that’s like 57% off the original price. What are you waiting for? Get it from audioMIDI today. No need to hurry though: the offer is valid until the end of May. → Read More
A bunch of granola chewing hippies freedom loving technologists sent a letter to President Obama, encouraging him to consider open source software. Signed by representatives from Novell, Red Hat, Unisys, and a bunch of other open source solutions companies, the letter is well-written piece of advocacy. Of course, not everyone supports the initiative. → Read More
When we heard about iLife ’09 last month, Apple touted the Faces and Places features of the iPhone and image stabilization and precise editing in iMovie. How much does all of this pleasure cost? $79 or nothing if you get it with a new Mac. But is it worth the upgrade?
The most prominent additions are Faces and Places. Places uses embedded GPS data to place your photos on a map and you can use… → Read More
Psst, buddy! Wanna make a quick $3,200? All you need to do is rat out someone you know who’s illegally using commercial software. Is $3,200 enough to compensate your lack of sleep and soul? → Read More
Whoever predicted that Apple would introduce iWork ’09 today gets a gold star. Keynote, Pages and Numbers all received what I would consider minor updates; no need to run around all willy nilly for these, methinks. → Read More
I’ve been looking for something like this my whole life — and of course now that I’ve found it, I can’t have it. MusicBox is the Masters thesis project of MIT Media Lab student Anita. I’ve never been impressed with things like Coverflow and Genius because they seem so shallow; there’s so much metadata in and around our music libraries that something more robust… → Read More
MIT professor Hal Abelson started today’s final presentation for the school’s “Building Mobile Applications” class by saying, “A course like this couldn’t have existed ten years ago… maybe not even a year ago. Courses like this right now are unique, but in two years they’ll be completely ordinary.” What’s extraordinary is that on top of a full college course-load at one of the… → Read More
Look at Apple, all busy filing patents and whatnot. Take this one (well, these ones), which shows several potential 3D interfaces for the Finder. The patents were first filed, according to AppleInsider, in June of last year under the name “Multi-Dimensional Desktop.” It’s as you might imagine: the Dock & Co. are able to move along the Z axis in addition to the normal XY axes. A… → Read More
Sure, you could pay $1.00 for this new VLC remote control app [iTunes link] for the iPhone (and iPod touch), or you could simply select “Add Interface, Web Interface” then point your iPhone to the resulting Web server. After that, you can apply this skin to your iPhone to make the whole package look a little more elegant. Not to knock the new app, mind you, but it strikes me as an unnecessary… → Read More
Here’s a random software recommendation for Mac OS X users. A ProTip, if you will. If you’re into IRC at all, you should check out Linkinus, which is developed by Conceited Software. I bought it last spring and have been using it ever since. Yes, I understand the concept of buying an IRC application borders on the insane, what with X-Chat being free and all, but the shareware period is… → Read More
Spending your fiat money from the comfort of your iPhone is even easier, now that Amazon has released an application (“App”) for Apple’s little wonder. The mundane functions are as you’d expect: you launch the app, then you can browse and buy goods from Amazon just as you would from your computer. What’s worth singling out is this little photo-takign feature. Using the app… → Read More
http://www.viddler.com/player/df48093d/ One of the most exciting things I’ve seen at Nokia World 2008 is the Point and Find service: aim a phone camera at an object and the camera detects what it is. Currently set to debut in London and San Francisco, the initial version of the application will be tied to movie posters. Point your camera at a movie poster and the software will identify the… → Read More
Israeli scientists have developed software that turns your ugly mug into a mathematically beautiful visage. Yes, we have evolved a great deal, us humans. What the software (a Photoshop plugin) does is alters a face to make it “look” more attractive, based on mathematics and “perceived” attractiveness. If you’ve watched any of those TLC or Discovery Channel documentaries about human… → Read More
You know the HP TouchSmart? It’s a neat bit of work—that is, it has to potential to be. That potential is now one step closer to reality given that HP has just opened it up to third-party development. Would-be developers need to sashay over to the TouchSmart Community. There you’ll find the necessary software to develop your fancy application. I think it’s fairly obvious… → Read More
Been putting off that Windows Mobile 6.0 upgrade for your HTC 8525? You’ve only got about 9 days left. HTC has announced that they will be removing all Windows Mobile 6.0 upgrades from their site. For our US readers, the only devices you need to worry about are the AT&T 8525 (HTC Hermes) and the T-Mobile Dash (S621). As PhoneNews points out, neither of these handsets have been given the… → Read More
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