Posts tagged electronics

CES 2012: A Gallery of Camera and Lens Guts CES gives us a look into the electronic entrails of some new gear. The above image is of the Panasonic Lumix GX1. Check out other camera and lens innards at Popular Photography.

CES 2012: A Gallery of Camera and Lens Guts

CES gives us a look into the electronic entrails of some new gear. The above image is of the Panasonic Lumix GX1.

Check out other camera and lens innards at Popular Photography.

popphoto.com

Time Inc. Skips The CES Bins, Sort Of; Offers Free Downloads Of All Titles From paidContent: Not too long ago, grazing the magazine bins was a perk of going to a trade show. But consolidation and closures mean fewer publications—and digital platforms offer access to the info without lugging around the ones that are left. Time (NYSE: TWX) Inc.‘s solution at CES this year? A magazine-shaped promo piece stacked in the publication bins but with none of the publishers’ content inside. Instead, the company played up its tablet editions and their cross-device access by offering them all free of charge at CES for download to iPad, Kindle Fire, Nook Tablet/Nook Color and Android devices via NextIssue. (You can try it this weekend; the free trial ends Sunday night.)… Instead of handling out cards for one free download or sticking with a single title or device, the company tried something that matches the best of its digital intentions: getting attention for its tablet strategy, while showing the device makers it can be a good partner and stressing an ecumenical approach at the same time.

Time Inc. Skips The CES Bins, Sort Of; Offers Free Downloads Of All Titles

From paidContent:

Not too long ago, grazing the magazine bins was a perk of going to a trade show. But consolidation and closures mean fewer publications—and digital platforms offer access to the info without lugging around the ones that are left. Time (NYSE: TWX) Inc.‘s solution at CES this year?

A magazine-shaped promo piece stacked in the publication bins but with none of the publishers’ content inside. Instead, the company played up its tablet editions and their cross-device access by offering them all free of charge at CES for download to iPad, Kindle Fire, Nook Tablet/Nook Color and Android devices via NextIssue. (You can try it this weekend; the free trial ends Sunday night.)…

Instead of handling out cards for one free download or sticking with a single title or device, the company tried something that matches the best of its digital intentions: getting attention for its tablet strategy, while showing the device makers it can be a good partner and stressing an ecumenical approach at the same time.

paidcontent.org

There is a hole in my heart dug deep by advertising and envy and a desire to see a thing that is new and different and beautiful. A place within me that is empty, and that I want to fill it up. The hole makes me think electronics can help. And of course, they can.

They make the world easier and more enjoyable. They boost productivity and provide entertainment and information and sometimes even status. At least for a while. At least until they are obsolete. At least until they are garbage.

Electronics are our talismans that ward off the spiritual vacuum of modernity; gilt in Gorilla Glass and cadmium. And in them we find entertainment in lieu of happiness, and exchanges in lieu of actual connections.

And, oh, I am guilty. I am guilty. I am guilty.
Mat Honan, Gizmodo, reporting on the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. Fever Dream of a Guilt-Ridden Gadget Reporter.
Foxconn Employees Threaten Mass Suicide Foxconn, the world’s largest electronic component maker (think: Apple, Amazon, Nintendo, Dell, Panasonic… well, you get the point) is not a nice place to work. So rampant have the suicides been that last year the company made workers sign pledges not to kill themselves. Via The Atlantic Wire: As American consumers ogle over shiny new gadgets at this week’s Consumer Electronic’s Show, the workers that make those products are threatening mass suicide for the horrid working conditions at Foxconn. 300 employees who worked making the Xbox 360 stood at the edge of the factory building, about to jump, after their boss reneged on promised compensation, reports English news site Want China Times.  It’s not like this is the first time working conditions at Foxconn have made news outside China. But iPhone and Xbox sales surely haven’t lagged in the wake of those revelations and neither Apple nor Microsoft has done much of anything to fix things.  As The Atlantic Wire points out, this week’s This American Life features a trip to a Foxconn factory in Shenzhen, China where approximately 350,000 to 450,000 people are employed. You can listen to the episode here. Image: Workers at Foxconn via China Southern Weekly Update: March 2012, Public Radio International and This American Life are running a retraction on their Foxcomm reporting. Information about that is here.

Foxconn Employees Threaten Mass Suicide

Foxconn, the world’s largest electronic component maker (think: Apple, Amazon, Nintendo, Dell, Panasonic… well, you get the point) is not a nice place to work. So rampant have the suicides been that last year the company made workers sign pledges not to kill themselves.

Via The Atlantic Wire:

As American consumers ogle over shiny new gadgets at this week’s Consumer Electronic’s Show, the workers that make those products are threatening mass suicide for the horrid working conditions at Foxconn. 300 employees who worked making the Xbox 360 stood at the edge of the factory building, about to jump, after their boss reneged on promised compensation, reports English news site Want China Times.  It’s not like this is the first time working conditions at Foxconn have made news outside China. But iPhone and Xbox sales surely haven’t lagged in the wake of those revelations and neither Apple nor Microsoft has done much of anything to fix things. 

As The Atlantic Wire points out, this week’s This American Life features a trip to a Foxconn factory in Shenzhen, China where approximately 350,000 to 450,000 people are employed.

You can listen to the episode here.

Image: Workers at Foxconn via China Southern Weekly

Update: March 2012, Public Radio International and This American Life are running a retraction on their Foxcomm reporting. Information about that is here.