Internet

Simple typography that  started out as a colon, dash, and parenthesis has now grown up and blossomed into a massive array of features, moods, and gestures. Who would have thought that a happy face :-) could ever lead to rock horns \m/, or tongue-tied :-&, or just a simple heart <3?

Today, the emoticon turns 30.… Read more

Birds were tweeting long before you started sending out 140-character messages about your daily commute. And British birdwatcher Bill Oddie doesn't want you to forget it.

So, today at least, Oddie did his part to turn Twitter over to the original tweeters of the world. He and the ZSL London Zoo's head bird keeper, Adrian Wallis, arrived early at the zoo's tropical aviary to interpret the roughly 70 residents' chirps in tweet form.

"Very territorial call from the Scarlet Chested Sunbird -- protecting its nest," read one tweet from Oddie with a sound file attached. Read another: "Here's the Roul Roul Partridge -- listen for high-pitch whistling -- a great way of keeping in touch in the dense jungle." … Read more

JetBlue will begin offering free in-flight Wi-Fi that is supposedly faster than anything its competitors have, according to The Verge.

An internal company e-mail recently sent updated employees about the new high-speed wireless plans that should be hitting the fleet in the first quarter of 2013. The official announcement is expected to be made at the World Low Cost Airlines Conference this week, but The Verge got a copy of the e-mail today.

Here are some more details from the e-mail:… Read more

There are few things in life that can't be improved by adding Bacon.

Google search results are the latest to learn this lesson. Queries containing an actor's name and "Bacon number" will show users the precise number of degrees between said actor and Kevin Bacon.

Playing with the new feature today, we found numbers for Leonardo DiCaprio (2), Humphrey Bogart (3) and Steve Jobs (2).

The Bacon number is a fun Easter egg -- and a highly useful tool for settling arguments at the pub. But it also represents Google's "Knowledge Graph" flexing its muscle.… Read more

Well, the iPhone event finally happened, and now we have nothing to talk about.

Just kidding!

We decided that everyone must be sick of talking about the new iPhone, so we did everyone a favor -- including ourselves -- and talked about everything but that. Hallelujah!

On this week's show, we continue to not care about HTC's possible tablets; we talk to TechCrunch's favorite sources and learn that a browser-based version of Spotify might be in the works; and on Thursday we will finally learn Wii U pricing and its release date -- that's almost two … Read more

When I was a tot, I learned my ABCs with pictures and words printed on sliced-up trees. I also watched "Sesame Street." These days, many kids are learning to spell with tablet computers. What will Google teach them?

Rolled out two years ago this week, Google Instant shows suggested queries as you type. It was billed as a time saver, shaving two to five seconds off each search.

Google figured that Instant would improve searches because it takes people 300 milliseconds between each keystroke, but only 30 milliseconds to glace at suggested results. Before Instant, it took people more than nine seconds on average to enter a term, according to the search engine.

Some love the feature, some hate it. Some claim their reputation has suffered because of it and have sought redress in court.

But one of the most intriguing things about Google Instant is how it presents a list of queries when a single letter is typed. This autocomplete alphabet, as it's known, changes frequently according to the most popular searches. Here's the latest snapshot of the alphabet, in halves: … Read more

Are you using Carbonite to back up your data? Good for you: I highly recommend some kind of cloud-storage service in tandem with a local backup.

Ah, but are you happy with it? The folks at CrashPlan think you can do better, and they're willing to put their money where their mouth is: existing Carbonite customers can get one year of CrashPlan backup absolutely free.

Typically, that would cost you $49.99. And if you're looking to protect more than one computer, you can purchase a family plan for $50 -- a price that buys you unlimited storage … Read more

While the Clint Eastwood speech and the acclaimed director's lecturing of an invisible President Obama stole the media spotlight during the Republican National Convention in Tampa, it was Obama's terse response via Twitter that received the most re-tweets during the GOP's big event in Florida.

A Twitter spokesperson told Talking Points Memo that the president's tweet -- which read "This seat's taken" and was accompanied with the above shot of a certain big-eared and very visible Democrat in the presidential chair -- was re-tweeted over 50,000 times. That made it the biggest … Read more

They danced, and they barked, and they hitched rides on Roombas. But in the end, no amount of cat cuteness could match the emotional punch of "Henri 2, Paw de Deux," a searing documentary of a tortured feline that last night won the coveted people's choice award at the first Internet Cat Video Festival.

The black-and-white film brilliantly portrays the existential struggles of a black cat known as Henri Le Chat Noir, who spares nothing as he bravely invites the cameras into the dark corners of his soul.

"I am free to go, yet I remain," Henri shares in French voiceover, as the camera zooms in on him staring forlorn out a window. "The 15 hours a day I sleep have no effect. I wake to the same tedium." … Read more