Hasta La Gadget!

When you open Beats Music – after you’ve signed up or signed in – you’re not going to find a playlist of music you’ve listened to a thousand times before. … Continue reading

Spotify has a bunch of playlists that listeners can browse. They are separated in a variety of genres, such as Pop, Rock, Dance, Chill, and etc. Of course you can create and share your own playlist, but wouldn’t it be cool if Spotify or any other music service could detect your mood and create a playlist based around that? Well that’s one of the features Spotify would love to implement in the future and they will be relying on your device’s sensors to help create something tailored to your mood. Now we’re not sure how Spotify plans on detecting whether we are happy or moody, but at least based on the accelerometer and other sensors built into our phones, Spotify will be able to detect if we are running, and from there create an up-tempo playlist that will motivate us.

The information collected from the sensors could include anything such as speed and heart rate and possibly body temperature, and from there, an appropriate playlist can be generated. According to Donovan Sung, Spotify’s product manager for discover and recommendations, “Maybe with motion sensors in phones, we can start guessing things whether users are running, biking or driving? Maybe the phone has a temperature sensor, or a heart rate sensor, we could guess whether the user is tense… […] The more we know about you, the better the [recommendation] engine can be.” What do you guys think of this idea? Yay or nay?

Spotify Wants To Use Your Device’s Sensors To Customize A Playlist For You original content from Ubergizmo.

Kim Dotcom is nothing short of an internet celebrity. Widely known as the man behind Megaupload, and the ostentatious lifestyle it afforded him, Dotcom was in totally different circumstances when an armed raid was conducted on his mansion near Auckland, New Zealand, almost two years ago. Since then, he has bounced back in spectacular fashion, launching a new cloud storage service called Mega, and has even talked about his plans to build an NSA-proof email service. Dotcom has launched another venture on the anniversary of that unfortunate raid, this time its a music streaming service called Baboom.

The new service is currently under a soft launch, it doesn’t have a lot of content to offer, in fact the only music available on it right now is by Dotcom. That’s right, he sings as well, his new album called Good Times is available for streaming through Baboom. Those who want to purchase the album are free to pay whatever they want for it, or pay nothing at all. On other music sites however, like Amazon and iTunes, the album costs $10. Dotcom has been able to bring in a modest amount of listeners on the new music streaming service, he tweeted that the first hour saw 78.321 song plays, given the fact that there’s only a limited amount of content available. We will have to wait for a full launch to see what direction Baboom ends up taking, but Dotcom says that this new service will be about “empowering artists.”

Baboom Is Kim Dotcom’s New Music Streaming Service original content from Ubergizmo.

If you’ve ever found yourself in a room where you discover that the acoustic properties create a great echo, you’ve probably tried to see how long you can make the echo last. I’ve certainly found myself clapping my hands or yelling “Helooooooo” when I find a space like that. But I’ve never heard an echo that lasted more than a couple of seconds. Recently, a scientist managed to capture an echo which was an astounding 112 seconds long.

After finding out about a maze of abandoned WWII oil tanks under Scotland, Professor Trevor Cox decided to see just how long an echo could last in one of these massive 25.5 million liter tanks. Incredibly, after firing a gun in the chamber, he realized just how much reverberation was in the space, and captured this astounding sound clip. Keep in mind you’ll need to wear headphones and crank up the volume to hear much beyond about the 40 second mark.

The sound was captured by firing a pistol inside the solid rock chamber, and it seems to go on forever. The broadband spectrum sound lasts for 75 seconds, while the lowest frequencies lasted all the way out to 112 seconds.

But it wasn’t exactly easy for Professor Cox to make it happen. He first had to squeeze through a narrow 18-inch diameter oil pipe to get inside of the tank – not something that I’d be likely to try.

Guinness World Records has certified the 75 second record, which blew away the prior one – which stood at just 15 seconds.

[via The Independent]

Back in the 1980s and 1990s, Roland’s TR-808 drum machine managed to attain legendary status. Due to its unique sound, many were able to identify in songs whether or not the TR-808 had been used. The sound and effects of the TR-808 have since been incorporated into keyboards and software, but after more than 30 years, it looks like Roland has decided that a true successor was needed in order to better meet the needs and demands of musicians today, whom they claim are on the lookout for new and exciting things to experiment with. Given the state of music these days, we can agree with those sentiments.  (more…)

Roland’s AIRA Teased As The TR-808′s Successor original content from Ubergizmo.