A new kind of search engine is coming to the web. In May, scientist Stephen Wolfram will launch Wolfram Alpha, a search engine that promises to actually answer your questions. For example, when you ask Google a question, the search engine answers with links that give you answers to your question. But when you pose a question to Wolfram, it will actually compute the answer. One simple input field that gives access to a huge system, with trillions of pieces of curated data and millions of lines of algorithms.
Along with being one of the largest, most established news organizations in the English language, The New York Times also continues to do a good job of trying to be as innovative, flexible and supportive of developers as a young startup company. The Times recently made their Article Search API and the Times Newswire API public to developers to encourage NYT content in new web or mobile applications. And The Times even supported developers with a Times Open event a few weeks ago and a Developer Network website to help build a little community around the Grey Lady’s content. What this means, is that you’ll hopefully be seeing more interesting uses of NYTcontent, like the way Newsmap uses Google News content or the Trackplaying app uses info from live BBC Radio content. Also, the NYT’s tried their hand at their own new skinning of their content with a new way to recreate the experience of reading the newspaper on a Sunday morning, with the Article Skimmer. Read even more on the NYT Prototypes site.
It’s spooky, at night, to see so much darkness, to hear skittering, to keep an eye out for homeless people trying to break in and sleep, to listen for the sounds of desperate humans and animals. This is not a scene from a post-apocalyptic movie, it’s novelist Susan Straight’s description of her neighborhood in Riverside, California where the unemployment rate is 12.2%.
