|  |  |  | | | | | Appletell | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Section: Features, Interviews, Originals  As the author of World Wide Mind: The Coming Integration of Humanity, Machines, and the Internet, Michael Chorost lays out a bold conceptual framework for a rudimentary solution for integrating networked neural interfaces into the human mind. Effortlessly blending the fields of neuroscience, biology, and Chorost’s own personal experiences breaking down social barriers to achieve deeper, more meaningful interpersonal relationships, the book is a love story wrapped in a scientific vision with a liberal dollop of speculation on how the technology would evolve the state of human communication.
I caught up with Dr. Chorost recently in his adopted hometown of Washington, D.C., fresh on the heels of the February 15th launch of World Wide Mind. We had a chance to explore some of the themes introduced in the book, and dig a little deeper into Chorost’s vision for how human communication might function if we were able to transmit emotional information and memories at the speed of the Internet. Below are excerpts from the interview, and be sure to check out the full Appletell review of World Wide Mind: The Coming Integration of Humanity, Machines, and the Internet. Appletell (AT): You speak about the human propensity to seek the creation of comunitas. Do you see this propensity continuing in a World Wide Mind, or would a new global community emerge? Michael Chorost (MC): I don’t see that as an either/or kind of thing. I think the important point in technology development is that we almost never see new technology completely replace an older form. Movies didn’t replace theatre, the telephone didn’t replace face-to-face conversation; they just created a new set of possibilities, and allowed people to look at the old possibilities in a different light. I don’t see this World Wide Mind I suggest [in the book] as taking anything away that we have now—it will add on a new layer, and may cause us to rethink small groups, communities, towns, and see them from a new perspective, and I certainly do not think that any of these forms will simply go away. AT: In a world that already encourages sensory overload, what mechanisms could the World Wide Mind provide to help filter out the new types of sensory information that would be shared? MC: Sensory overload, and overload in general, is a huge problem now, and it’s still going to be a problem in the future. I think the answer is what I talked about in relation to the [interpersonal relationship building] workshops. You have this world of constant distraction, and we’re not going to get rid of that world. But what I learned in the workshops was how to really focus on just one other person. That’s really an amazing thing to learn; it’s not that I didn’t really know it before, but there is no substitute for really being able to practice it in an organized environment. It was a school—a school for learning these kinds of skills. We don’t need to turn off technology—we need to learn to turn on that human facility of mutual focus and mutual attention. AT: With discussion of interconnected minds, we almost have to have a reference to the Borg from Star Trek. If we were all communicating in this vast internetworked world, do you foresee the need for a central authority, in Star Trek terms like the Borg Queen? MC: That was a question I didn’t have the time to explore in the length I would have liked to in World Wide Mind, because I had to meet a really stiff deadline. The idea of the Borg Queen in Star Trek was kind of added on later—initially the Borg were this decentralized, dehierarchicalized entity; not, of course, that Star Trek is really noted for consistency. We know that ants do this—ants exist completely at the will of the colony, even though there is no single directive making stuff happen in the colony. There are all these built-in rules that govern how the colony behaves, so even ants aren’t following centralized orders. That works for ants because ants don’t have a subjective consciousness to begin with. I feel that the answer that I came up with in the book, allusions to ant and bee colonies, really wasn’t an answer, it was just a gesture at what’s possible. AT: Do you see a continuing interdependence of humans and machinery, or more human-like machines growing out of our current dependence on technology? MC: With the current state of technology I don’t see that at all. I think technology like Watson is fundamentally an illusion. It looks like it’s doing the same thing as a human, but it really isn’t. The most important difference between Watson and you is you can say, “I don’t want to play Jeopardy, I’d rather play chess.” The important point is Watson couldn’t want to play chess, or Deep Blue couldn’t want to play checkers, and there’s nothing in the computational world that approximates that sense of wanting. Machines as we know them do not have an inherent quality of wanting anything. AT: The World Wide Mind technology you propose involves some pretty drastic measures, including genetic modification, implantation of LEDs in the skull, and implantation of other circuitry and connections in the brain and skull. Given this challenging barrier to entry, what vector for human/machine integration do you see apart from therapeutic uses as you discuss in the book? MC: This is a big divide in bionics: the divide between therapy and enhancement. When a part of your body is broken—like your ear, and it’s drastically affecting the quality of your life—then you’re willing to take the risk of surgery to have a device implanted inside of you that will help. If you don’t have that problem then the equation changes entirely. In the book I’m not proposing that people undergo these kind of drastic technologies—you would never get this past the FDA. The point of the book is that this kind of technological intervention is conceptually discussable. In Star Trek, it is simply taken for granted that the technology required by the Borg exist, but it gives you no idea how it actually works and the writers have no idea how it works. Be sure to check out World Wide Mind, and Michael Chorost’s blog. Full Story » | Written by Aaron Kraus for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »
 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Section: Mac Software, Writing / Publishing, Reviews  Provides: Dictation
Format: Digital download or DVD
Developer: Nuance
Minimum System Requirements: Intel-based Mac, Mac OS X v10.6 Snow Leopard, Internet connection for product registration, Nuance-certified USB microphone for Mac (included, except for upgrades).
Processor Compatibility: Intel only
Price: $179.99 download, $199.99 physical shipment, $49.99 upgrade
Availability: Now
I’ve been battling typing and mousing pain for nearly as long as I’ve been using computers—almost two decades now, so I’m very selective about input devices I use. My priorities are light action, smooth clicking, light and smooth mouse tracking, and, with keyboards, a short travel and a soft landing with a minimum of "over–center" feedback. I also use dictation software for as much of my long form composition as is practical, and wherever and whenever else it’s efficient to do so. I began using dictation software back when discrete dictation was still de rigueur, obliging…users…to pause…between…each…spoken…word…like…this. Continuous speech technology, which arrived in the late ‘90s, was a massive leap forward for the technology. And today, Nuance’s Dragon Dictate speech recognition software is the state of the art both on Macs and Windows, capable of transcription of dictation at rates faster than I like to speak, and definitely faster than I can type, and with amazing accuracy. Back in the ‘90s, the old discrete dictation software was so clumsy, slow, and error-prone that I couldn’t imagine anyone using it unless they were obliged to for health reasons. However, Dragon Dictate is so good today that it’s well worth considering as an efficiency enhancer even if typing pain is a complete non-ssue for you. It’s so quick, slick, and accurate even with a minimum of voice training that I don’t doubt Nuance’s claim that it can speed up typing performance by up to three times the rate even skilled typists can acheive with a keyboard, thus presenting an attractive alternative to manual typing. Unfortunately, there was one significant bug I encountered in the early builds of DragonDictate 2.x causing it to transpose the last two letters of some words in transcribing spoken dictation to digital text. This was most evident when dictating into third-party applications, and mostly absent when using Dictate’s own Notepad application, but since one of Dictate’s marquee features is its ability to enter dictated text virtually anywhere, it amounted to a serious and aggravating flaw. Dragon Dictate 2.0.3 Update Released I’m happy to report that bug was eliminated with the release of the Dragon Dictate 2.0.2 update in early February. Since then I’ve been dictating articles into my favorite text editor, Text Edit Plus, as well as email software, browser Web forms and so forth, and the transcription bug has evidently been completely squashed. Dictate is now an un-alloyed pleasure and joy to use, and the version 2.0.3 update that followed several weeks later—fixing an issue that could cause unusually high CPU usage—adds a further level of refinement. In addition to allowing you to use your spoken voice instead of a keyboard to produce text, you can also control your Mac by voice with Dictate. Instead of using your keyboard and mouse, just speak commands into the microphone to launch and control applications, move the cursor, or click anywhere on screen by voice. Dictate has four modes: Dictation Mode, Command Mode, Spelling Mode, and Sleep Mode. Dictation Mode is self-explanatory, but while you’re in it you can also issue commands. When in Command Mode, the program recognizes and executes only commands, and can be considered “Command Only” Mode. A completely new Spelling Mode made its debut with MacSpeech Dictate 1.2, allowing users to spell words, names, or acronyms by using either natural language or the International Radio Alphabet (Alpha, Bravo, Charlie, Delta, Echo, etc.). Sleep Mode simply lets you toggle the microphone and application on and off. Another Dragon Dictate feature is Phrase Training, which helps you increase accuracy by letting you train your voice profile as you proceed. While most of the speech recognition industry refers to this feature as “correction,” which is accurate in the sense that it can indeed be used to correct text in your documents, this descriptor in some respects misses the point because ongoing training also helps refine Dictate’s ability to recognize what you intended to say. With Phrase Training you’re not stuck with the level of accuracy arrived at with your initial voice training until you take the time to read more training stories, and you don’t have to specifically train the recognition engine from a document or selection. Instead, you can train a phrase immediately when you see it was misrecognized. Then the next time you dictate that phrase or word in the phrase, Dragon Dictate is more likely to recognize it accurately. Rating Dragon Dictate presents a bit of a conundrum. On the one hand, it’s the closest to perfection in Mac dictation software anyone has yet achieved. On the other hand, there is still room for improvement, especially in making getting up to speed with its more advanced features more intuitive and user-friendly. There are also a few functional niggles that could stand some work. I wish there was a way to hide the floater control palette (even though it’s a lot prettier than the old one in MacSpeech’s former PowerPC dictation product iListen) when it’s not in use other than closing the program. Working on a 13.3” MacBook screen, one cherishes every square millimeter of desktop real estate.  The program also still takes a long time to start up, which is I guess somewhat inevitable when it has to load a voice profile and dictionaries before you can get underway, a process limited by processor and hard drive speed. A 7200 RPM hard drive would probably speed things up noticeably. However, once it's running, even on my 2.0 GHz Core 2 Duo MacBook with 4 GB of RAM—a relatively modest spec. power-wise these days—Dictate is satisfyingly responsive.
The Plantronics microphone headset that comes bundled with Dictate has proved excellent, equal to or better than any mics I ever used with MacSpeech iListen. It’s light, adjustable, and attractive-looking, and it has a conveniently long cord. The mic does require a USB dongle, which uses up a precious USB port, but I prefer the precision responsiveness of a hard-wired mic to the lesser accuracy I’ve experienced dictating with Bluetooth wireless microphones. For now, I’m giving Dragon Dictate 2.0.3 a four out of five rating, but with a bullet. At this stage of the game it’s your best (actually only) Mac OS dictation solution, and a tool well worth having in your software suite. Dragon Dictate requires an Intel-based Mac, Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard or greater, 3GB of available hard drive space, 2GB of RAM recommended and an Internet connection for product registration. The software comes complete with a bundled, Nuance-approved Plantronics USB microphone headset that’s lightweight and comfortable to wear for long sessions. Dragon Dictate for Mac 2.0.3 sells for $199.99 through Nuance's Website with a USB microphone serving as the standard headset with new purchases. A Bluetooth microphone option is available. Existing MacSpeech Dictate customers and Dragon NaturallySpeaking customers can upgrade to Dragon Dictate for Mac starting at $49.99 and $99.99 respectively for a limited time. The version 2.0.3 update is free for registered version 2.0 and 2.0.2 users. Full Story » | Written by Charles Moore for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »
 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Section: iPhone / iPod touch / iPad, iPhone, iPod touch, iDevice Accessories, iPod, iPod Accessories, iPod Headphones and Earbuds, Reviews  Provides: In-ear audio reproduction with integrated MEMS microphone
Developer: Moshi
Minimum Requirements: 1/8” audio output jack, Apple iPhone for mic functionality
Price: $80.00
Availability: Now
If you’re a regular reader of Appletell, you know we’re fans of Moshi products. Their iDevice accessories almost always land amongst our favorites, and their Mac accessories have been outstanding complements to Apple’s melding of form and functionality. Moshi has now jumped into the audio arena with their Vortex in ear headphones with iPhone mic. The result is a decent listening experience for the price, but with plenty of room to improve. The Vortex features a RigidBody™ steel alloy construction that has substantial weight to it. They’re not so heavy that they’re pulling on your ears, but you definitely know they’re there. If you’re used to Apple’s lightweight earbuds, you’ll need some time to adjust to these. The sintered steel alloy construction—coupled with the high definition Neodymium drivers—is used to deliver better bass. And that, they do…perhaps too successfully. Combine these with a proper fit (easily achieved with the three sizes of hybrid-injection silicone ear tips and one set of memory-foam ear tips included with your purchase), and the bass can easily become overwhelming. I’m not going to call it muddy, just overbearing. The mids and highs sound fine, after all, when it’s just them. Nice and clean. But when there’s a lot happening in the low end, it can drown out everything else. This works okay for games and some movies, and is acceptable with certain forms of music. But if you’re listening to classical, pop and even some less aggressive rock, the Vortex headphones aren’t the best you can do. It’s not entirely fair to fault Moshi for this. They state right on the box that the headphones are “sonically optimized for: rock, pop, hip hop r&b and electronic,” so this was their intent (and that optimization makes it great for games and action movies). But I wasn’t fully satisfied with the tests I ran on pop and some rock music, and you’ll want to make sure you’ve got quality audio sources, regardless. The instructions recommend compression with a bit rate of 192k or higher, but I wouldn’t drop below 256k regardless of your headphones. Technical specifications: - Frequency response: 10-20kHz (-10dB/1kHz)
- Impedance: 18 ohms
- Sensitivity: 100 ± 3dB @ 1kHz
- Cable length: 1.2 meters
The Vortex headphones also include a microphone on the cable. Again, it’s not the best in-line microphone I’ve used, but it does the job. It’s certainly good enough to explain that you’re out for a jog and you’ll call back after your shower. I do like, however, that there’s only one, easily accessible button on the microphone. There are no volume buttons to get in your way, just one button to control all of the necessary functions: click once to pause music or take a call, click and hold to end or decline a call, double click to skip to the next song, triple click to go back, etc.  The braided cable itself is very light, which helps to prevent the heavier ear pieces from pulling down against your ear canal. The drawback is that as they swing and brush against yourself, you will hear it through the headphones. It’s not noticeable when you’ve got the big bass playing through, but it can be on softer songs.
And finally, Moshi also includes a handy and very easy to use silicone carrying case for the headphones. It keeps your headphones safe and the cable tangle free when not in use. And unlike many other cable management devices I’ve tried before, this one gives me a quick, secure hold every time I used it. At $80, the Moshi Vortex headphones are nicely wedged between your low end $30 options and the $120 bottom of the high end range. The price is exactly what it should be for what you’re getting—a nice improvement over Apple’s earbuds with enough power to provide a more substantial listening experience. There may be too much bass here for some listeners, but it’s at least clean, and you have been warned, after all. As such, those seeking a cleaner, more pure listening experience can still expect to spend at least $50 to $100 more elsewhere. Full Story » | Written by Kirk Hiner for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »
 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Section: Macintosh / Apple Hardware, Peripherals, Reviews Provides: ultra high quality audio input
Developer: Blue Microphones
Minimum Requirements: USB 2.0 port or XLR
Price: $249
Availability: Now What do you get when you take an already great microphone, turn up the quality to uncompromising levels and add every feature you could possibly need or think of? Blue’s Yeti Pro is the answer to that winning combination. Yeti Pro starts with the original Yeti, an already amazing microphone, and adds a stereo XLR output and support for 24-bit recording, among other things. It’s hard to believe it only costs $50 more than the original Yeti.  There are a few things that are new with the Yeti Pro. Obviously, Yeti Pro supports 24-bit recording, which is great, but you’re going to hear enough about that from me in a minute. Yeti Pro also now can be used as an analog mic with stereo XLR output. The jack on the Yeti Pro itself is not a standard XLR connection. It’s a stereo XLR output; don’t worry, an adapter to regular XLR is included. This connection is necessary since regular XLR doesn’t support stereo audio with a single cable. All you have to do is connect the included cable to get two XLR outputs (left and right). Blue also changed the volume knob a bit, making it much more sturdy. Plus, now it’s a digital control, meaning it doesn’t have physical minimum or maximum values. You can just keep turning it and turning it and turning it. If you’re using the Yeti Pro for its audio out capabilities, this knob will directly control the computer’s volume level (think volume keys). Okay, enough of this, let’s get to what really matters, how well Yeti Pro performs. Let it be known that the Yeti Pro is one ridiculously sensitive microphone. If you use it in 24-bit mode (likely the main feature that drew you to this microphone in the first place), then you’ll notice this fact very quickly. If you aren’t familiar with the differences between bitrates, let me very quickly explain. A higher bitrate gives you a larger dynamic range for volume. If you’re familiar with Blue’s previous Yeti USB microphone, then you know this mic is already extremely proficient at picking up quiet noises. The Yeti Pro is even better thanks to the 24-bit support. This also means you don’t have to worry about your recording levels as much as you might be accustomed to. The resolution of this thing is just incredible. Even audio sources with low volumes are easily mic’d by the Yeti Pro with superb quality. But it’s not all fun and games. Mostly, yes, but not all. The Yeti Pro hears everything. Yes, it hears more than your mother, teacher or anyone else who seems to hear everything you don’t want them to combined. And similar to all of those situations, it’s sometimes a bad thing. For instance, when I was testing the Yeti Pro on a guitar cabinet, even at higher volumes, I was able to hear the unprocessed sound of me playing the guitar in the same room. The guitar cabinet wasn’t enough to drown out the sound of my strumming the background, even on cardioid mode pointed towards the cabinet. I will say I had the gain cranked on the Yeti Pro at the time, but what I’m trying to say is that you need to prepare your recording environment properly if you want to get the best audio possible. That means separating the Yeti Pro from anything you don’t want it to hear. This isn’t really a big surprise. If you’re this serious about your audio, you should already be accustomed to this sort of thing. I just wanted to point out that it’s even more important with Yeti Pro.  Another good example is the sound of vibrations. If you have an external hard drive sitting on the same surface as the Yeti Pro, you’re most likely going to hear it in your recordings. Remember, being able to record everything is a feature, not a bug. You just have to prepare for it. One way to alleviate this is by using a shock mount. Right now that’s a little difficult with the standard base, but Blue’s working on a shock mount just for the Yeti and Yeti Pro. You can expect to see more of this guy later this summer. You should already know the Yeti Pro—as a result of being built from the same good stuff that made Yeti—sounds amazing. With its four mic patterns (Stereo, Cardioid, Omnidirectional and Bidirectional), you’ll be able to configure the mic to optimally pick up any sound. And unlike lower quality mics, what goes in is exactly what comes out. What I mean is that your recorded audio will match your source audio almost exactly, which isn’t something you can say of lower quality mics. But the most important question here is whether can you really hear the difference between the higher quality of the Yeti Pro compared to something that’s still very good, like the original Yeti? That’s an excellent test, and here’s how I did just that. I picked a song in iTunes and played it through some nice speakers. First I recorded it with Yeti, then with Yeti Pro. Both mics were set with the same mic patterns and had the same placement. I then played back the recordings to see which sounded most like the original. I was prepared to come back saying there wasn’t much of a difference. I was wrong. The Yeti Pro is noticeably clearer than the original Yeti thanks to its increased resolution. Honestly, it sounded almost identical to the original song file with Yeti Pro, and just barely off with Yeti. But don’t get me wrong, it’s not like Yeti is all of the sudden a bad microphone. It’s still a superb microphone, but there is a discernible difference between the Pro and the original, and it’s all thanks to the 24 bit support. But that’s to be expected. Why release another model if it’s not actually better? It’s extremely easy to recommend the Yeti Pro; even easier than the original Yeti. It’s an amazingly sensitive microphone that can not only deliver amazing audio quality over USB, but now over XLR too. The Yeti Pro does the job of four ultra high definition microphones, or maybe even more, thanks to its four mic patterns and support for digital and analog output. It even functions as great audio output, making it an all in one solution. Simply put, I’ve never had the pleasure of testing a better microphone than Yeti Pro. Full Story » | Written by Jake Gaecke for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »
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