Posts tagged good
If Google+ Is Good, Why Does Google Force It On Us?
May 22nd
Google really, really wants us to like Google+. Google is embedding Google+ into each of its products, making it increasingly difficult to use its services without embracing the Google+ borg, whether you want to or not.
Judging by Google+’s still stagnant market share, you generally do not want to use the social service, or whatever it is.
When prodded by complaints that Google is forcing Google+ into its disparate products, despite not necesssarily fitting very well, Vic Gundotra, Google’s senior vice president over Google+, rejected the criticism at Google I/O:
I’m not sure that [the integration is] forced. I think there are some people who may have a misunderstanding of what we’re trying to accomplish… One of the core insights we had when we started Google+ was that Google itself was deeply fragmented.
So what did Google do? It invented Google+ as “a way for Google to get to know [its] users,” according to David Glazer, director of engineering for the Google+ platform. This is fine, so far as it goes, but this speaks to Google+’s value for Google, not its users.
For example, I use Zagat, a restaurant rating service that Google acquired in 2011, all the time. And each time that I use it now, I get this obnoxious prompt:
This wouldn’t be a huge problem except that it pops up every single time I visit Zagat.com. Including when I’m on my mobile device. See that little X in the top right? That’s much harder to see/find on an iPhone.
Even worse, if I click on “Start now” Google takes me away from Zagat entirely and into Google Local, orienting me into whichever city I’m currently sitting in, rather than letting me get back to the location I was actually interested in (often New York, as I experiment with new restaurants).
Google, in short, is foisting Google+ on me for its good. Not mine.
As Forbes‘ Robert Hof highlights, Google can’t seem to articulate why users should want to use Google+. They seem to have the party line down as to why it’s good for Google (see above), but for users? Google draws a blank.
Which is surprising, given how good Google is at convincing us to use its different products. Maps? It’s amazing, and much better than Apple’s Maps application. Search? Been the gold standard for years. Now? Revolutionary, and is sorely tempting me to dump my iPhone. Even Google+ features like Hangouts are increasingly services that I turn to for quick collaboration with colleagues.
But Google+ as a forced integration between Google’s products? It just gets in my way and slows me down. Until Google figures out why I should want to use it, rather than have to use it, Google+ will remain a social also-ran, however much Google tries to force it.
View full post on ReadWrite
Now Google Wants To Kill The Mobile Web (Good Riddance)
May 15th
Mobile versions of websites are so 2009.
You know those clunky, stripped-down versions of sites with addresses that tack an “m.” onto the beginning, and serve up a dumbed-down, limited version of their content? If Google has its way, those sites are headed for the dustbin of history.
At I/O, Google’s developer conference held this week in San Francisco, executives Sundar Pichai and Linus Upson showed off examples of websites that traveled smoothly from desktops to tablets to smartphones. A website for the upcoming second installment of the Hobbit movie franchise let you soar above Middle Earth on many devices. And a racing game had cars leaping from smartphone to tablet to laptop.
The vehicle of this, of course, is Google’s Chrome Web browser, which is now available across all those platforms (including, as of last year’s edition of the I/O conference, Apple’s iPhone and iPad).
The point of the demonstrations: You should be able to build your website once and have it adapt to different computing environments, a notion called “responsive design.” Rather than force the creator of a website to design for specific screen sizes and interfaces – like keyboards versus touch screens, say – or force users to go through contortions to use websites optimized for the limitations of the wrong device, websites should just sense what computing device is being used and reconfigure themselves accordingly.
Just a few years ago, that sounded like a pipe dream – hence, the proliferation of mobile-optimized websites standing alongside full desktop versions.
At ReadWrite, we haven’t just been writing about responsive design. Since last October, when we launched a major redesign of our site, we’ve been living it. So we’re naturally biased in favor of this concept.
It will take time and effort to rearchitect websites for this reality. And there will always be those holdouts- particularly within large, slow-moving businesses – who insist on designing for older versions of Web browsers or mobile devices. Legacy technologies which haven’t made the cross-platform leap, like Adobe’s fading Flash, need to be winnowed out. But those problem areas will increasingly be the exception, not rule.
Let’s just have one Web. That seems easier.
Photo by Nick Statt for ReadWrite
View full post on ReadWrite
Now Google Wants To Kill The Mobile Web (Good Riddance)
May 15th
Mobile versions of websites are so 2009.
You know those clunky, stripped-down versions of sites with addresses that tack an “m.” onto the beginning, and serve up a dumbed-down, limited version of their content? If Google has its way, those sites are headed for the dustbin of history.
At I/O, Google’s developer conference held this week in San Francisco, executives Sundar Pichai and Linus Upson showed off examples of websites that traveled smoothly from desktops to tablets to smartphones. A website for the upcoming second installment of the Hobbit movie franchise let you soar above Middle Earth on many devices. And a racing game had cars leaping from smartphone to tablet to laptop.
The vehicle of this, of course, is Google’s Chrome Web browser, which is now available across all those platforms (including, as of last year’s edition of the I/O conference, Apple’s iPhone and iPad).
The point of the demonstrations: You should be able to build your website once and have it adapt to different computing environments, a notion called “responsive design.” Rather than force the creator of a website to design for specific screen sizes and interfaces – like keyboards versus touch screens, say – or force users to go through contortions to use websites optimized for the limitations of the wrong device, websites should just sense what computing device is being used and reconfigure themselves accordingly.
Just a few years ago, that sounded like a pipe dream – hence, the proliferation of mobile-optimized websites standing alongside full desktop versions.
At ReadWrite, we haven’t just been writing about responsive design. Since last October, when we launched a major redesign of our site, we’ve been living it. So we’re naturally biased in favor of this concept.
It will take time and effort to rearchitect websites for this reality. And there will always be those holdouts- particularly within large, slow-moving businesses – who insist on designing for older versions of Web browsers or mobile devices. Legacy technologies which haven’t made the cross-platform leap, like Adobe’s fading Flash, need to be winnowed out. But those problem areas will increasingly be the exception, not rule.
Let’s just have one Web. That seems easier.
Photo by Nick Statt for ReadWrite
View full post on ReadWrite
Android Is Fading Into The Background—And That's A Good Thing
May 13th
This week’s Google I/O conference is promising to be an anticlimactic event when it comes to new products running Android, Google’s mobile operating system for smartphones and tablets. And that may be a good thing.
The Year of Android was 2011. That was the year that Android became a stable platform and sales of smartphones running the operating system began to rocket towards the moon. Android was all that anybody could talk about, for good or bad.
Two years later, Android is almost a forgotten term among the partners Google depends on to make hardware.
By our count, four major smartphones running Android have already launched this year: the Samsung Galaxy S4, HTC One, HTC First and LG Optimus G Pro. All of these smartphones are some of the best to ever hit the market in terms of screens, batteries, processors and cameras. Even the HTC First, considered a ho-hum middle-market device, is of such quality that it helps to redefine what a middle-market smartphone can be.
Each of these smartphones shares a distinct trait: They all run on Android, and yet its presence is not a talking point. Instead, the smartphones themselves take center stage. The HTC One is best known for its “ultrapixel” camera, Zoe camera features and BlinkFeed home screen. The Samsung Galaxy S4 is so packed with features (like Air Gesture, Air View and Smart Scroll) and Samsung-made apps that the underlying Android operating system is hardly recognizable. The First is, of course, the “Facebook Phone,” running the Facebook Home launcher. The Optimus G Pro is a large-screen phablet, or smartphone-tablet hybrid, with a couple of neat user interface tricks up its sleeve.
The Device Has Become The Story
For Android’s first five years, the story about every new smartphone running Android was the operating system. How well does it work? Do apps run without crashing? What Android features are present and how well do they work? When manufacturers like Motorola, Samsung or HTC announced new smartphones, they would show off what can be done with Android. If something was good or bad about a device, it was Android that received the praise. Or the blame.
I was at the launch events for the Galaxy S4 and the HTC One. At both events, Android was mentioned exactly once, in passing to note what operating system the phones were running. In reviewing those two smartphones, I hardly thought about Android at all. The focus was on the features of the smartphones, such as the improved cameras and battery life.
Android’s Inflection Point
The first Android smartphone was released in October 2008. The HTC G1 was a curiosity. Most people thought of it as the “Google Phone,” and it was notable only because it came pre-loaded with Google apps like Maps.
Looking back over five years of Android, we can break it down into two distinct eras: What came before Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich and what came after.
Gingerbread, released in December 2010, is still the most-used version of Android. It was the release that supercharged Android smartphone sales across the globe. But it defined an early era of Android development where manufacturers and users had to play a guessing game about compatibility with screen sizes and hardware.
Ice Cream Sandwich, which came out less than a year later, was the biggest leap that Android has made in its short history. This was the version where Google started to take design, performance, functionality, and ease of use and development more seriously. With Ice Cream Sandwich, Google made it simpler for developers and manufacturers to build apps for multiple screen sizes and varying chipsets. In Ice Cream Sandwich, the improvements that had been introduced in Android Honeycomb 3.2 (designed specifically for tablets) were merged with the core of Android 2.3 Gingerbread.
With Ice Cream Sandwich, Android not only became usable, it became seamless—and that’s when it started to fade into the background.
Since Ice Cream Sandwich, Google has worked to refine Android’s features, functionality and performance and been very successful. Last year, Google announced Android 4.1 Jelly Bean, a mostly iterative update that brought a couple neat tricks to the operating system, like its “Android Beam” NFC sharing, resizable widgets and Google Now. Google announced last year at its I/O developer conference that performance in Jelly Bean was a key focus (the so-called “Project Butter”) and the results were noticeable. Since Ice Cream Sandwich, users and developers have complained less about Android’s fragmentation problem, apps not working on different devices and screen sizes.
It is very telling that the focus for Jelly Bean (both version 4.1 and 4.2) was not on new features, but performance. It took several years for Google to get Android to the point where it wasn’t fighting itself but rather creating a platform that just worked well.
The Benefits Of Android Maturity
At the beginning of 2012, Google started requiring that apps show consistency in look and user experience across the board. The goal of Android’s Holo Themes: ensuring that various Android “skins,” or interface layers on top of the core Android OS, would look consistent while also allowing designers to differentiate the look of their apps. This, along with a variety of improvements in CPU performance and efficiency within newer devices, has led Android to a state where the operating system no longer gets in its own way.
What has this led us to? A developer landscape where apps built for Ice Cream Sandwich and Jelly Bean run with more consistency and reliability. Smartphones and tablets where the manufacturers can create excellent features and experiences that are built on top of Android without needing to be a feature of the operating system itself.
Some argue that this scenario puts Google at a disadvantage, allowing Samsung, the dominant Android smartphone maker, to take advantage of a weakened Android and push its own innovations.
I disagree. A sign of maturity for any technology platform is when it stops being primary topic of conversation and becomes part of the background.
It has taken the half-decade since the first Android smartphone for the operating system to get to this point, but now that Android has matured, everybody from app developers to smartphone and tablet manufacturers benefit. The ultimate winner then becomes the consumer who reaps the benefits of a platform that allows innovators to push the boundaries of what is possible.
View full post on ReadWrite
5 Ways You May Be Stuck In the “Good Ol’ Days” of SEO
May 9th
Let’s take a trip down memory lane and revisit some of those almost ancient SEO techniques, see what the current day equivalent might be, and see how Google has learned to adapt – and as we do, ask yourself the question, have we?
View full post on Search Engine Watch – Latest
The Internet May Not Be Doing Our Brains Much Good [Video]
May 8th
Working on the Internet every day, you start to have certain suspicions about how it affects the way you think and process information. Turns out, there’s something to that.
Readers of Nicholas Carr’s 2010 book The Shallows: What the Internet Is Doing to Our Brains will certainly confirm this. While the Internet is a fantastic tool to conduct business and communicate with friends and colleagues, the constant distractions can and do have an interruptive effect on how we think and learn.
The animation team at Epipheo Studios recently interviewed Carr and put together a video on the topics expressed in The Shallows. It is presented to you here, somewhat ironically, as one of those distractions that the Internet can present you during the course of the day.
Pick a time to watch it on your own schedule, and then think about ways in which you can start unplugging a bit more in your busy online life. You may not buy into this, but we can share one thing with you: every writer who has written for our Pause series of stories has reported a reduction of stress or some other calming effect.
Taking time for yourself to just think and be is not only relaxing, it may help avoid the dinosaurs and sharks in your life.
Image courtesy of Shutterstock.
View full post on ReadWrite
Google Glass: Way Too Much Google For Its Own Good
May 7th
If Google is making us stupid, Google Glass is destined to make us even stupider. While consistent with Google’s mission to “organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful,” Google Glass may actually be too much of a good thing. Way too much.
Jay Yarow describes Glass as “a product plagued by bugs, and of questionable use, that’s generating a lot of buzz because people want so desperately to have some new gadget to latch onto, and fear being wrong about the next major technology trend.” Perhaps. But whatever its faults (battery life, tends to cause headaches, etc.), Google Glass’ biggest fault may well be its biggest feature:
Information overload.
By constantly presenting Glass wearers with information, or the opportunity to get information, Google manages to over-deliver on its mission statement at a time when we actually rely on Google to filter out noise, rather than fill our lives with more noise. As I wrote in 2007, the secret to Google’s business model is to embrace the abundance of the Internet’s information overload but then remove the detritus and give me only what I want, when I want it, and serve up context-relevant advertising.
But by sticking a computer on my face, always on and always connected, Google has ruined this model by giving me far more than I want, all the time, and diminishing my control of the flow of Google-provided information.
Google Now gets the balance nearly perfect. Google Now anticipates my information needs based on where I’m going, what I have on my calendar, the time of day, etc. It’s genius, and it’s particularly useful because it lets me discover its magic on my own terms; that is, I have to actually look at my smartphone. Robert Scoble may see this as a downside, but it’s a serious upside. When I have to look, I’m in control of the information. When the information forces itself into my view, I’m a slave to it.
Google Now is Google at its best. Google Glass? Perhaps Google at its worst, shoving information at me and never letting me disconnect from the Internet completely.
Nor will it end here. Google co-founder Sergey Brin has stated that “We want Google to be the third half of your brain.” I doubt many people will be enthusiastic about this, no matter how much Google anticipates my wants and needs and serves up ads against them, 24×7. With Glass, Google has taken a step too far toward pushing information on its users rather than letting them control the flow of information.
In short, Glass is way too much Google for most of us. And that is the major reason I expect it to fail.
View full post on ReadWrite
Good News, Everyone! It's The 10 Best Inventions From Futurama
Apr 29th
Futurama, the animated comedy from Simpsons creator Matt Groening and writer David X. Cohen, is unparalleled in its ability to mix lowbrow humor with high concept science and technology. But after an initial run on Fox from 1999 to 2003 and a glorious revival six years later, Comedy Central has pulled the plug and will end the show with its seventh season this summer.
In keeping with ReadWrite’s mission to map the programmable universe, we figured that a roundup of some of the greatest inventions from the year 3000 was most definitely called for. Futurama, after all, was always at its best turning some recent technological development or scientific notion into farce.
Did we miss any? Let us know in the comments.
Disclaimer: We decided to keep it light-hearted, so we apologize in advance to any fans of the infamous suicide booth.
1. Smell-O-Scope
In the show’s first season episode “A Big Piece Of Garbage,” the Smell-O-Scope was Professor Farnsworth’s seemingly useless space smelling invention. As he explained, “If a dog craps anywhere in the universe, you can bet I won’t be out of the loop.” It certainly came in handy when it detected a giant ball of garbage — a last-ditch effort by New York in the year 2020 to stave off overflowing landfills — that was hurling towards the Earth. The ensuing antics involved continuous spoofs on the 1998 film Armageddon.
Turns out that in 2011, a small company actually invented a handheld Smell-O-Scope, although it dubbed it the Nasal Ranger Field Olfactometer. Killjoys.
2. Scooty-Puff, Jr.
When Fry was tasked with saving the universe from the Brainspawn in season four, he had to infiltrate their secret base, the Infosphere. Fry’s allies against the brains, the highly intelligent yet adorable Niblonians, gave him the Scooty-Puff, Jr. for the task. A wind-up contraption resembling a children’s toy, the Scooty-Puff, Jr. ended up falling apart when Fry tried to escape, leading him to request a more advanced vehicle — the larger, more impressive Scooty-Puff, Sr.
3. Fing-Longer
Invented by Professor Farnsworth in an alternative timeline — one he detected via the What-If Machine in the season two episode “Anthology of Interest I,” the Fing-Longer allowed the wearer to reach farther than normal — say, to press buttons. Not exactly groundbreaking, but who couldn’t love a name like the Fing-Longer?
Not only does this device now actually exist as a Wii mote accessory, the idea of the Professor getting inspiration from himself provided an interesting philosophical conundrum. Can you be said to have invented something if the initial inspiration came from some external source, even if that external source is an alternate version of yourself? Yeah, we’ll get back to you on that.
4. Mind-Switcher
The season six episode “The Prisoner of Benda” introduced this invention of Professor Farnsworth and Amy, the Mind-Switcher. After a dizzying number of mind switches, the whole crew is in disarray with everyone in someone else’s body.
This episode generated what was apparently the first mathematical theorem created for a television show. Futurama writer Ken Keeler, who holds a doctorate in mathematics, wrote the Futurama Theorem as both a real-world theorem and the solution used in the show that proves “that regardless of how many mind switches between two bodies have been made, they can still all be restored to their original bodies using only two extra people, provided these two people have not had any mind switches prior.”
5. What-If Machine
The What-If Machine was a Professor Farnsworth device that could predict a scenario based on any “what if” question it was asked. After a series of events that pertain to each character on the crew and their respective “what if” questions, the Professor tosses the machine in the garbage, declaring it a failure due to the preposterous scenarios it generated. The whole episode turns on its head when everything is revealed to be one huge, layered simulation from the What-If Machine, generated when the Professor asks what if he had invented the Fing-Longer.
6. eyePhone
One of the few times Futurama took a swipe at real-world companies and products, the season six episode “Attack of the Killer App” introduced an obvious parody of a well-known Apple device. The writers envisioned a 31st Century eyePhone as an actual eye implant that projects a holographic screen in front of the user’s face.
7. Forwards Time Machine
Featured in one of the show’s best episodes, “The Late Philip J. Fry,” the Forwards Time Machine is a Professor Farnsworth invention that only lets you move through time in one direction, specifically to avoid temporal paradoxes (a topic the show has explored in past episodes). Fry joins Bender and the Professor to take the machine one minute into the future, though of course they screw up and get thrown thousands of years forward. Ultimately, they have nowhere to go except the end of time.
In true high-low concept fashion, Bender, Fry and the Professor couch it on lawn chairs, crack some beers and proceed to watch the universe end, only to realize that a new Big Bang begins to happen all over again. Turns out that idea is an actual scientific model, called the Big Bounce, that posits that the universe is forever oscillating through a cosmic boom-bust cycle.
8. The Electronium Hat
Invented by the Professor to give animals super intelligence, the Electronium Hat was a wearable device introduced in the season one episode “Mars University.” It used sunspots to produce “cognitive radiation,” whatever that means. The monkey Guenter gets uplifted by the hat and spends much of the episode quarrelling with Fry and lamenting the fact that he can’t live his natural life due to his unnatural super-smarts.
9. The Clone-O-Mat
In the season two episode “A Clone Of Mine Own,” the Professor introduces his own 12-year-old clone, named Cubert. Created via the Professor’s Clone-O-Mat, Cubert gets named as the Professor’s heir.
The Clone-O-Mat makes a return in the season four episode “Jurassic Bark,” one of the rare but emotionally powerful moments when Futurama shifted from comedy to animated drama. Nominated for an Emmy, the episode explores Fry’s anguish after discovering his former dog Seymour’s fossilized 21st century remains, a find that prompts Fry to agonize over whether or not to clone his long-lost animal companion.
10. The Spheroboom
Of all the Professor’s many doomsday devices, the Spheroboom was his favorite and the one device that he couldn’t part with when selling his stash to Hedonismbot in “Bender’s Big Score,” the straight-to-DVD film that became part one of season five. The Spheroboom appears to bend an object around its center until it implodes in an explosion of “doom radiation.”
In a not-so-subtle jab at the National Rifle Association, the episode introduced the National Ray-Gun Association, which protested a three-day waiting period for mad scientists to purchase doomsday devices.
View full post on ReadWrite
Good News, Everybody! It's The 10 Best Inventions From Futurama
Apr 29th
Futurama, the animated comedy from Simpsons creator Matt Groening and writer David X. Cohen, is unparalleled in its ability to mix lowbrow humor with high concept science and technology. But after an initial run on Fox from 1999 to 2003 and a glorious revival six years later, Comedy Central has pulled the plug and will end the show with its seventh season this summer.
In keeping with ReadWrite’s mission to map the programmable universe, we figured that a roundup of some of the greatest inventions from the year 3000 was most definitely called for. Futurama, after all, was always at its best turning some recent technological development or scientific notion into farce.
Did we miss any? Let us know in the comments.
Disclaimer: We decided to keep it light-hearted, so we apologize in advance to any fans of the infamous suicide booth.
1. Smell-O-Scope
In the show’s first season episode “A Big Piece Of Garbage,” the Smell-O-Scope was Professor Farnsworth’s seemingly useless space smelling invention. As he explained, “If a dog craps anywhere in the universe, you can bet I won’t be out of the loop.” It certainly came in handy when it detected a giant ball of garbage — a last-ditch effort by New York in the year 2020 to stave off overflowing landfills — that was hurling towards the Earth. The ensuing antics involved continuous spoofs on the 1998 film Armageddon.
Turns out that in 2011, a small company actually invented a handheld Smell-O-Scope, although it dubbed it the Nasal Ranger Field Olfactometer. Killjoys.
2. Scooty-Puff, Jr.
When Fry was tasked with saving the universe from the Brainspawn in season four, he had to infiltrate their secret base, the Infosphere. Fry’s allies against the brains, the highly intelligent yet adorable Niblonians, gave him the Scooty-Puff, Jr. for the task. A wind-up contraption resembling a children’s toy, the Scooty-Puff, Jr. ended up falling apart when Fry tried to escape, leading him to request a more advanced vehicle — the larger, more impressive Scooty-Puff, Sr.
3. Fing-Longer
Invented by Professor Farnsworth in an alternative timeline — one he detected via the What-If Machine in the season two episode “Anthology of Interest I,” the Fing-Longer allowed the wearer to reach farther than normal — say, to press buttons. Not exactly groundbreaking, but who couldn’t love a name like the Fing-Longer?
Not only does this device now actually exist as a Wii mote accessory, the idea of the Professor getting inspiration from himself provided an interesting philosophical conundrum. Can you be said to have invented something if the initial inspiration came from some external source, even if that external source is an alternate version of yourself? Yeah, we’ll get back to you on that.
4. Mind-Switcher
The season six episode “The Prisoner of Benda” introduced this invention of Professor Farnsworth and Amy, the Mind-Switcher. After a dizzying number of mind switches, the whole crew is in disarray with everyone in someone else’s body.
This episode generated what was apparently the first mathematical theorem created for a television show. Futurama writer Ken Keeler, who holds a doctorate in mathematics, wrote the Futurama Theorem as both a real-world theorem and the solution used in the show that proves “that regardless of how many mind switches between two bodies have been made, they can still all be restored to their original bodies using only two extra people, provided these two people have not had any mind switches prior.”
5. What-If Machine
The What-If Machine was a Professor Farnsworth device that could predict a scenario based on any “what if” question it was asked. After a series of events that pertain to each character on the crew and their respective “what if” questions, the Professor tosses the machine in the garbage, declaring it a failure due to the preposterous scenarios it generated. The whole episode turns on its head when everything is revealed to be one huge, layered simulation from the What-If Machine, generated when the Professor asks what if he had invented the Fing-Longer.
6. eyePhone
One of the few times Futurama took a swipe at real-world companies and products, the season six episode “Attack of the Killer App” introduced an obvious parody of a well-known Apple device. The writers envisioned a 31st Century eyePhone as an actual eye implant that projects a holographic screen in front of the user’s face.
7. Forwards Time Machine
Featured in one of the show’s best episodes, “The Late Philip J. Fry,” the Forwards Time Machine is a Professor Farnsworth invention that only lets you move through time in one direction, specifically to avoid temporal paradoxes (a topic the show has explored in past episodes). Fry joins Bender and the Professor to take the machine one minute into the future, though of course they screw up and get thrown thousands of years forward. Ultimately, they have nowhere to go except the end of time.
In true high-low concept fashion, Bender, Fry and the Professor couch it on lawn chairs, crack some beers and proceed to watch the universe end, only to realize that a new Big Bang begins to happen all over again. Turns out that idea is an actual scientific model, called the Big Bounce, that posits that the universe is forever oscillating through a cosmic boom-bust cycle.
8. The Electronium Hat
Invented by the Professor to give animals super intelligence, the Electronium Hat was a wearable device introduced in the season one episode “Mars University.” It used sunspots to produce “cognitive radiation,” whatever that means. The monkey Guenter gets uplifted by the hat and spends much of the episode quarrelling with Fry and lamenting the fact that he can’t live his natural life due to his unnatural super-smarts.
9. The Clone-O-Mat
In the season two episode “A Clone Of Mine Own,” the Professor introduces his own 12-year-old clone, named Cubert. Created via the Professor’s Clone-O-Mat, Cubert gets named as the Professor’s heir.
The Clone-O-Mat makes a return in the season four episode “Jurassic Bark,” one of the rare but emotionally powerful moments when Futurama shifted from comedy to animated drama. Nominated for an Emmy, the episode explores Fry’s anguish after discovering his former dog Seymour’s fossilized 21st century remains, a find that prompts Fry to agonize over whether or not to clone his long-lost animal companion.
10. The Spheroboom
Of all the Professor’s many doomsday devices, the Spheroboom was his favorite and the one device that he couldn’t part with when selling his stash to Hedonismbot in “Bender’s Big Score,” the straight-to-DVD film that became part one of season five. The Spheroboom appears to bend an object around its center until it implodes in an explosion of “doom radiation.”
In a not-so-subtle jab at the National Rifle Association, the episode introduced the National Ray-Gun Association, which protested a three-day waiting period for mad scientists to purchase doomsday devices.
View full post on ReadWrite
A Good Start For Paid Search In 2013
Apr 25th
It’s April, which means that spring is here and the first quarter of 2013 is in the books! The birds are chirping, the flowers are blooming, and the ads are clicking. Aren’t the landing pages pretty at this time of year? At Kenshoo, we sit on some massive data sets that we share each…
Please visit Search Engine Land for the full article.
View full post on Search Engine Land: News & Info About SEO, PPC, SEM, Search Engines & Search Marketing
