Technology & Innovation — September 3, 2010

The Digital Frontier: TV

“TV shows are emerging as a new front in the war over digital media between Amazon.com Inc. and Apple Inc., amid their ongoing battles over electronic books and online music.”

bigthinkeditor

“TV shows are emerging as a new front in the war over digital media between Amazon.com Inc. and Apple Inc., amid their ongoing battles over electronic books and online music.

Hours after Apple said Wednesday that it would begin renting some shows for 99 cents per episode, Amazon cut its price on a similar set of shows to 99 cents from $2.99. … A price battle between the tech titans could help drive consumer interest in the nascent market for paid on-demand video over the Internet. But it could also drive away the media giants that Apple and Amazon are counting on to feed them with TV content. Some media executives worry low prices could eventually undermine the existing TV business.”

a computer generated image of a human brain.

Thinking

The great free will debate featuring Michio Kaku and Steven Pinker

Who — or what — really controls your mind?

Building destroyed by the Halifax Explosion. Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division Washington, D.C.

The Past

The largest accidental explosion of all time

More than a century ago, Halifax suffered an accidental blast one-fifth the size of the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima.

a collage of photos of a man with a hat and a book.

High Culture

6 great books with wildly unreliable narrators

Dive into the twisted truths and concealed realities told by literature’s most unreliable narrators.

a group of five matches on a pink background.

The Well

Signs you’re burned out — and how to bounce back

If you don’t feel better after the weekend, the “burnout paradox” could explain why.

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7 min

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with

Laurie Santos

Starts With A Bang

The trick to instantly identifying JWST images

If you can identify a foreground star, the spike patterns are a dead giveaway as to whether it’s a JWST image or any other observatory.

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