Consumer content

Breaking: White House Tumblr says it's GIF, with a 'hard G'

The first post on the White House's official new Tumblr boldly tackles a topic sure to inspire as much debate in certain circles as immigration reform, tax cuts, and gun control -- the pronunciation of "GIF."

I, being the softie that I am, have always pronounced the acronym for Graphical Interchange Format "jif" (it sounds more French), but the White House informs me I am wrong and may be declared an enemy of the state. "Hard G," it declares on a graphic (or is that jraffic?) previewing the kinds of content we should expect to see on the new Tumblr -- everything from behind-the-scenes photos to updates on policy and First Dog Bo (and, presumably, Bo's take on policy updates).

And because a Tumblr without them wouldn't be worth its weight in dancing cats, "yes, of course there will be GIFs," it says. … Read more

Betaworks takes majority stock in Instapaper

Instapaper creator Marco Arment has sold a majority stake of the service to the New York-based Betaworks, Arment announced on his blog today.

Instapaper is a bookmarking tool that lets users save content for later reading. Arment said the service was getting too big for him to manage on his own.

"I did almost everything myself, which worked well for the first few years, but for the past year, I've had a lot of trouble keeping up with it," he wrote. "Instapaper is much bigger today than I could have predicted in 2008, and it has … Read more

Twitter may soon tell you what's going on nearby, right now

If you've ever wondered what people near you are tweeting about in real-time and thought that might help you find cool things going on nearby, Twitter may soon offer exactly that feature.

According to AllThingsD, Twitter may well be working on new features that would show tweets from people near you.

"Twitter is in the process of testing a new feature that lets you discover tweets from people within a certain distance of your location," AllThingsD said it had been told by multiple sources. "The idea is to surface relevant activity based on where you are … Read more

FitBark, a kind of Fitbit for dogs, launches on Kickstarter

NEW YORK--Worried about Fido getting a little too chunky? Now you can track how active your dog is by using FitBark, a sort of Fitbit for pets.

FitBark, a New York-based startup, launched the product Thursday on Kickstarter and at the NY Tech Day tech show in Manhattan, seeking funding to produce its wearable fitness tracker for pets.

For a $99 pledge, people receive a wearable bone-shaped device, a home base that collects data, and a three-month subscription to the service. The FitBark mobile app itself is free. (FitBark is not affiliated with Fitbit.)

"We all wondered how we … Read more

'Star Trek' Wikia fan portal warps into cyberspace

A new enterprise was born today. The Trek Initiative brings together wiki host company Wikia and Roddenberry Entertainment, the creators of "Star Trek," in a brave new Web site dedicated to offering fans a home planet on the Internet. It offers communities for fan interaction, fan fiction, fan films, and rare images from the Roddenberry Entertainment archives.

Hard-core Trekkies will particularly enjoy a 55-minute audio clip of Gene Roddenberry discussing his motivations for "Star Trek" and his views on the future of humanity. The "Star Trek" franchise is currently under the ownership of CBS, publisher of CNET.… Read more

Nintendo: Don't expect a big event at E3 this year

Unlike previous years, Nintendo will not make a major splash at the E3 gaming expo in June.

Speaking to shareholders on Thursday, Nintendo CEO Satoru Iwata confirmed that his company will not hold a major showcase at E3. Instead, his company will focus on smaller presentations centered around its many software titles.

"First, we decided not to host a large-scale presentation targeted at everyone in the international audience where we announce new information as we did in the past," Iwata told investors. "Instead, at the E3 show this year, we are planning to host a few smaller … Read more

Dark Horse dangles 50 free digital comics

Free digital comics! That always gets comic book fans revved up, and the latest batch can be had courtesy of Dark Horse Comics.

The comic book house, which was founded in 1986, is celebrating the two-year anniversary of Dark Horse Digital by offering free digital editions of the first issues of 50 different comics. The freebies include a variety of titles such as Joss Whedon's "Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season 8 No. 1" and "Serenity: Those Left Behind No. 1," Felicia Day's "The Guild No. 1," Mike Mignola's "Hellboy: Seed … Read more

YouTube to get its funny on with Comedy Week

If you think you might need a good laugh or two come mid-May, you might want to keep YouTube in mind.

Google's Internet video subsidiary on Thursday announced the first-ever YouTube Comedy Week, scheduled for May 19 through May 25.

It will start out on the evening of the 19th with the global live-stream of an all-star comedy variety featuring a mix of stand-up, sketches, and musical performances. Then as the week unfolds, YouTube said, there will be dedicated programming that includes live performances, new episodes from popular YouTube comedy channels, and curated top 10 lists from comedy stars. … Read more

Google Doodle honors jazz legend Ella Fitzgerald

Jazz vocalist Ella Fitzgerald would've been 96 years old on Thursday, prompting Google to commemorate the date with its latest doodle.

Known as the "First Lady of Song" and the "Queen of Jazz," Fitzgerald was born on April 25, 1917, and grew up to become one of the world's most celebrated jazz singers, typically ranked as one of the top three female jazz singers of all time along with Billie Holiday and Sarah Vaughan. "Lady Ella" sang professionally for more than 50 years, selling more than 40 million albums and winning 13 Grammy awards.… Read more

Top-trending music topics on Twitter to fuel new TV show

Do you like music and want to know what the hottest music-related stories are? A new TV show that features the top trending music topics on Twitter hopes to have you covered.

Known as "Trending 10," the new show is being produced for music-oriented cable TV network Fuse, in partnership with Twitter and gum company Trident.

The idea, the companies said in a release, is to build "Trending 10" around the Top 10 music-related Twitter topics of the day. Those stories will be selected based on Fuse's "heat tracker" algorithm, a system that … Read more