Music

New album from ex-Groupon CEO fails to crack iTunes Top 100

I confess that I have never bought a Groupon, because it always seemed to require paying money to do something I didn't want to do.

I feared I might feel the same way about listening to former Groupon CEO Andrew Mason's new album "Hardly Workin'."

I had understood that Mason was a bit of a wag and a prankster, and I thought that when his opus hit iTunes Tuesday morning there might be, well, a Groupon. Or at least a deal.… Read more

Shock: Research says pot makes you lazy (but not psychotic)

You are not going to bereefer this.

In fact, you might need to steady yourself by whatever means you normally choose to create a little peaceful comfort.

You see, a group of scientists have got together, studied the brains of pot smokers and decided that regular marijuanists have brains that enjoy deficiencies.

These, specifically, involve a stunted ability to synthesize dopamine, a little neurotransmitter which, when fed correctly, makes you want to start a company called Facebook, climb Kilimanjaro, or run the 100 meters in 8.2 seconds.

Yes, a blunt can blunt your need to succeed.

I am grateful to PopSciRead more

Are audiophiles wasting their money on expensive gear?

Let's face it: our "indulgences" can get expensive, so whether we go to sports events or concerts, buy flashy clothes or jewelry, gamble, drink, or take lots of vacations, those things can add up to a lot of money. Smoke a $6 pack of cigarettes every day, and you'll see close to $22,000 go up in smoke over the next 10 years. In that context, dropping serious cash on a great hi-fi doesn't seem out of line.

Middle-class audiophiles with $10,000 hi-fis might appear to be a wee bit over the top, but … Read more

Judge orders rapper to get Twitter etiquette lessons

Tweets are the soundbites that you don't even chew over.

Before they even come into your head in some full form, you thrust them out onto the world in the hope of instant approbation.

You might imagine that rappers, who live in the rhythm of words, would all be Twittermeisters.

And yet one Philadelphia judge decided that Meek Mill, a rapper who hopes for an immodest future, needs a little help with his 140-character pronouncements.

As the Philadelphia Inquirer reports, Meek was put through the legal mill after allegedly violating his probation following drug and gun convictions.

One of … Read more

Zu Audio's outrageously awesome speaker

It's been a few years since I wrote my last Zu Audio speaker review, but this time out I wanted to try their least expensive tower, and that's where things got interesting.

The Zu Audio Omen Standard and Omen Dirty Weekend (DW) are virtual twins, but with one very significant difference: the DW uses "recycled" drivers. That is, the DW drivers come from Zu customers who traded up to one of Zu's higher-end drivers. Let's stop right there: Zu Audio is one of the rare speaker companies to offer upgrades in any form, but … Read more

Abyss AB-1266 headphones run $5,495, but they're worth it

Elegantly designed, affordable products are marvels of our age, but then there are the extreme, defiantly outrageous ones designed to thrill. Take the new 640-horsepower Dodge SRT Viper GTS: this $120,000 supercar looks like a venomous snake with wheels and can propel its owner to insanely fast speeds, but the car probably won't be of much practical use as a grocery hauler or picking up the kids from soccer practice. The Abyss AB-1266 is the SRT Viper GTS of headphones. It's a no-holds-barred attempt to build the best-sounding headphone on the planet.

The mostly metal design is … Read more

Control how drunk the band is in awesome music vid

Member of the London band Moones embrace a rock 'n' roll lifestyle. And they don't just let fans share in it, they want them to be able to control just how rock 'n' roll they get in their latest music video.

The YouTube video for the band's song "Better Energy" takes advantage of YouTube annotations to allow viewers to determine how drunk the band is at any point in the performance. … Read more

Surgically implanted headphones are literally 'in-ear'

Headphones can be so easy to lose -- but not when you have them implanted in your ears.

That's what Rich Lee decided to do. Inspired by an Instructables tutorial on how to make invisible headphones using magnets and a coil necklace with an attached amplifier, the 34-year-old entrepreneur went a step further and implanted one such headphone in each ear.

The magnets sit on the outside of the tragus, the part of the ear that projects immediately in front of the canal. The magnets function as speakers, and the coil around Lee's neck transmits to them. … Read more

Apple: Don't make nuclear weapons using iTunes

I've been feeling a little crabby this week.

People have been annoying me for seemingly no good reason. But it hasn't yet gotten to that stage where I want to build a nuclear weapon and set it upon them.

I mention this only because, should I reach that demented level, I cannot use iTunes in the manufacture of that weapon.

You see, I have an iTunes account. And, thanks to the diligent Jim Dalrymple at The Loop, I now realize that I have already agreed not to design or produce nuclear weapons with the help of Apple's … Read more

Google Glass porn app is back (but sans porn)

Being at the party is more important than what you wear.

Even if the check-shirted, bottom-faced killfuns at Google insist you have to wear something.

This is the only conclusion I can reach after hearing that "T**s And Glass" -- no, I haven't asterisked out an "a" and a "t" -- is returning to Google Glass.

Those of healthily lascivious bent might recall that Google banned this app a few weeks ago. Its nature revealed too much of nature.

However, MiKandi, the enterprising Mama Teresas behind this conception, decided to bend over backwards to accommodate Google's hissing insistence on strictness.… Read more