pattern

It may not be terribly surprising that many of us find our moods dipping over the course of the day, and that by nightfall we light up again. Or that our moods are perkiest on weekends, regardless of which days our weekends fall on (i.e., Fridays and Saturdays in the United Arab Emirates).

What's of note, according to an analysis of 2.4 million tweets in 84 countries by researchers out of Cornell, is that these mood trends hold steady across cultures and borders, hinting at some sort of deeper trend whose basis is in being human, not … Read more

One of the dangers of sharing your creative work online is that other people can easily steal it and claim it as their own. Watermarks are one easy way to make sure that your name is never disassociated from your digital images. WaterMark V2 is a versatile program that lets users add custom watermarks to their images without a lot of hassle.

The program's interface isn't the most intuitive thing we've ever seen, but we were able to figure it out fairly easily with a bit of poking around. The first step involves creating the watermark itself, … Read more

While still in its infancy and primitive, even crude, two grids of 16 microelectrodes implanted atop the brain of a volunteer with severe epileptic seizures are somewhat successfully decoding brain signals into a small set of words, thanks to work out of the University of Utah.

The volunteer, who was already having part of his skull temporarily removed so doctors could implant larger electrodes (see button-like numbers in photo) to locate the source of his seizures, agreed to also have these two grids of tiny electrodes implanted over the speech centers of his brain.

His brain signals were then recorded … Read more

Some folks would rather not finish a crossword puzzle than look up the answer; to them, it researching an answer feels like cheating. For those who like to learn new words and don't see anything wrong with a little assistance, there's Cross+A, a feature-packed application that can help you solve just about any kind of puzzle.

Cross+A's interface is plain and somewhat utilitarian, with its 158,000-entry word list displayed in the main pane. Small icons across the top give users access to each of the program's many features. We can't even begin … Read more

Cutter allows users to create basic patterns for shoulder and waistline garments. Although it does create patterns as promised, it offers little guidance along the way.

The interface is sparse and somewhat intuitive. The program's functions are somewhat obvious just by virtue of the fact that there are so few of them. You choose what kind of garment you want (jacket, pants, dress, and so on), enter the measurements of the person it's being made for, and the program creates a printable pattern. The built-in Help file is brief, and though it does offer helpful tips for measuring … Read more

Google thinks it has made a breakthrough in "computer vision."

Imagine stumbling upon a picture of a beautiful site in Europe filled with ancient ruins, one you didn't recognize at first glance while searching for vacation destinations online. Google has developed a way to let a person provide Google with the URL for that image and search a database of over 40 million geotagged photos to match that image to verified landmarks, giving you a destination for that next trip.

The project is still very much in the research stage, said Jay Yagnik, Google's head of … Read more

Personality tests are fun nonsense, in line with horoscopes and fortune tellers. I've taken a bunch of them over the years, both online and offline, and never learned anything consistent or surprising about myself.

The results are always in vague, yet flattering, language that's impossible to dispute: Hmm, I guess I do like being with people, and I enjoy parties. And yet, I also enjoy quiet time to myself, as well as contemplating the nature of the universe. Oh, and I love taking personality tests!

Signal Patterns offers a twist on the "know yourself" personality test … Read more

Want a cool looking background for your site or favorite nanoblogging service like Jaiku, Pownce, or Twitter? Check out BgPatterns, a site that's not unlike the Web 2.0 stripe generator in that it lets you put together really slick looking repeating backgrounds with a simple builder.

To make one you just pick out what kind of pattern you want, and choose the colors. It'll blend all the elements together and give you a simple JPEG file you can use wherever. Advanced users who want a little more control can tweak things like scale, image rotation, and opacity … Read more

ARLINGTON, Va.--A quartet of Facebook's platform engineers took the stage on Wednesday morning at the Graphing Social Patterns: East conference, for a discussion led by conference organizer Dave McClure about what's next for the social network's developer initiative. Speaking to the developer-heavy audience at the small conference were senior platform manager Dave Morin, program manager Josh Elman, product manager Ruchi Sanghvi, and director of platform product marketing Benjamin Ling.

Morin said that the social network has hit the milestone of 80 million active users worldwide.

As is typically the case with conference panels featuring Facebook employees, … Read more