Thursday, May 19, 2016

Top of the News - 19 May

*1. Day 1: Google I/O Wrap-up

Google's annual I/O Conference is in full swing and the tech company is announcing a bunch of new stuff. Key product announcements: Google Home to compete with Amazon Echo; Allo messaging app to compete with FB Messenger (WhatsApp); and Duo video chat app to compete with FaceTime. The foundation behind these new tools is Google assistant, which is Google Now on AI steroids.

None of this stuff is available for use, yet. Google says, "This summer."

The Verge has a good rundown of all the big stuff announced - The 10 biggest announcements from Google I/O 2016

+ From WaPo - Google Home, Google Assistant and other big announcements from Google’s developer conference

+ And in Google's own words, from Official Google Blog - I/O: Building the next evolution of Google

*2. There goes the market...

From NYT - Fed Is Seriously Considering Raising Interest Rates in June, Meeting Minutes Say

"The Federal Reserve sent a sharp, simple message to financial markets on Wednesday: Pay attention."

And that message caused this...

Market Is Mixed After Release of Fed Minutes

Ugh...

*3. "In 1492, Columbus sailed the ocean blue"

From NYT - U.S. Returns a Stolen Christopher Columbus Letter, but Mystery Remains

"What remain a mystery — or at least the subject of a continuing investigation — are the crucial particulars to fill in the gaps of an intriguing, international case of whodunit."

+ And just because it's funny... - The Sopranos Guys attacking Columbus Day protesters

*4. Building tires for electric cars

From Wired - The Obsessive, Secretive Race to Make the Perfect Tire for Electric Cars

"Electric vehicles complicate things further, because they demand more of everything. They lack the roar of an engine to drown out the brain-numbing drone of rubber on asphalt, so quiet matters. Range is crucial, so the tires must play their part in pulling every mile from every watt. The torquey performance demands rubber stout enough to keep up. And electrics are expensive enough without worrying about buying them new shoes every few thousand miles."

*5. A Hangar Filled With Tragic Memories

From NYT - Once Filled With Symbols of Hope and Despair, a 9/11 Repository Is Set to Close

"Hangar 17 at Kennedy International Airport is large enough to house a Boeing 747. For 14 years, however, it has held something much larger: the morning of Sept. 11, 2001."

BONUS MATERIAL

*"Walk This Way" (Spend some time with this. Really. You won't be disappointed.)

This WaPo interactive article on the making of the Aerosmith/Run-DMC "Walk This Way" collaboration is AWESOME. I'm always intrigued by the creative process that delivers iconic art, and this is a special look at how this collaboration came to be.

The inside story of when Run‑DMC met Aerosmith and changed music forever

"It’s 1986. Rap music is explosive and on the rise but still misunderstood and barely represented in the mainstream. The leading innovators are Run-DMC, a trio from Queens who sport black leather jackets and unlaced Adidas sneakers. Two albums into their career, Joseph “Run” Simmons, Darryl “DMC” McDaniels and Jason “Jam Master Jay” Mizell are already minor stars and musical revolutionaries. For their third album, producer Rick Rubin, a 22-year-old white kid from New York University, comes up with a crazy idea: He recruits Steven Tyler and Joe Perry, the leaders of the down-and-out arena-rock group Aerosmith, to collaborate with Run-DMC on a new version of their 1970s staple “Walk This Way.”

BOTTOM OF THE NEWS

Heavenly Aerials of Pools Will Send You Right Into Summer

Why High-Skilled Freelancers Are Leaving Corporate Life Behind

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