Compare Today With Every Day That Came Before
"It starts with a simple yellow block that represents today. Then, with each click of the mouse, today is contextualized in a wider and wider scope. Today is placed on a timeline of this month, then this year, this century, this eon, the history of the Earth, the history of life, and the history of the universe" via Co.Design
Intricate, Ultra-Accurate Blueprints of Botanical Life
"Murayama has dissected and modeled dozens of specimens, from the unfurling splendor of Asiatic dayflower to the Poppy-like simplicity of Yellow Cosmos. After drafting the innards of each plant (beginning at a microscopic level), he uses the rendering software 3ds Max to model each piece. Then, he finishes off each drawing by adding architectural call-outs to the details. These images look faked—but they’re actually remarkable thorough scientific illustrations." via Gizmodo
Travel Site Recommends Flights Based On How Pleasant They Will Be
"The site has a team of experts that pulls data from around the web – compiling their own database which knows the plane layouts of various airlines, travel times and amenities on-board. Routehappy is the first site to put all of this data in one place, making it easier to search based on comfort factors, not just schedule and price. All of this data has allowed the company to create a “happiness factor” when searching for flights, ranging from 1-10. Turning the numerous data points they’ve collected into an easily understandable way to choose the most comfortable flight." via PSFK
How Half a Second of High Frequency Stock Trading Looks Like – information aesthetics
"In the movie, one can observe how High Frequency Traders (HFT) jam thousands of quotes at the millisecond level, and how every exchange must process every quote from the others for proper trade through price protection. This complex web of technology must run flawlessly every millisecond of the trading day, or arbitrage (HFT profit) opportunities will appear. However, it is easy for HFTs to cause delays in one or more of the connections between each exchange. Yet if any of the connections are not running perfectly, High Frequency Traders tend to profit from the price discrepancies that result." via infosthetics
Camera Tells The Visually Impaired Where To Focus
"The app uses facial recognition and voice accessibility to help the user focus the camera.The phone tells the user how many faces are detected and in focus. The app does away with the shutter button to make it easy for the visually impaired. The user simply has to swipe upwards to take a photo. The app also triggers an audio recording function when it is turned on. The phone records audio for thirty seconds to help the users remember what was going on at that specific moment." via PSFK
Basic Phone Lets Parents Keep In Touch With Their Toddlers
"1stfone weighs just 40g and is delivered pre-programmed and ready‐to‐use straight out of the box. It is easy to operate as kids just press a name button to make a voice call. The phone is designed to keep children safer from bullying and enable them to make or receive a call when they need to. It can hold up to twelve numbers and is available in different colors and styles. Parents decide who the phone can call, providing them with peace of mind and a first phone for their child." via PSFK
An App That Turns Digital Reading Into A Social Activity
"If Dotdotdot has one killer function, it’s the highlighter. Not a new tool, to be sure. But having a single, familiar interaction to ground the app’s entire experience comes in handy. Your highlights, and their attached comments, can be pooled with those made by your friends, which together form a beautiful, chapter-esque view of a document. You can even turn the highlights into inspirational, pullquote-style pages to share (all the citations are automatic) on Facebook or Twitter. The brilliance is that all of this indexing and sharing happens through the same channel–a simple highlight." via Co.Design
Personal Prediction Apps Google Now, Grokr, and Osito
"A new type of mobile app is departing from a long-standing practice in computing. Typically, computers have just dumbly waited for their human operators to ask for help. But now applications based on machine learning software can speak up with timely information even without being directly asked for it. They might automatically pull up a boarding pass for your flight just as you arrive at the airport, or tell you that current traffic conditions require you to leave for your next meeting within 10 minutes." via MIT Technology Review
Algoraves: dancing to algorithms
"Alex sez, "Algoraves are parties where people come together to dance to algorithms. It generally involves some live coding but any producers making music "wholly or predominantly characterised by the emission of a succession of repetitive conditionals’ are welcome. Generally some aspect of the algorithmic processes are visible, but the focus is actually on the audience, and having serious fun." via Boing Boing
Greenhouse :: OMEagination
"Gesture based 3D visualization of brain structures and activity. Created in collaboration with University of California San Francisco and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory as part of the OME Precision Medicine Summit using Oblong Greenhouse SDK, FSLView, and a consumer depth sensor." via Vimeo
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