It’s relatively easy to find coffee table books on music, but how many of them give you the tools to make that music? Korg’s does. The company has introduced a bundle that pairs its new NTS-2 do-it-yourself oscilloscope kit with a Patch & Tweak with Korg book from Bjooks (which also made books for Moog and Roland) that explores semi-modular synthesis. You’ll find the usual history and artist interviews, but you’ll also find guides to help you use the NTS-2 in tandem with synths and other equipment.
The NTS-2 is a companion of sorts to the NTS-1 synth and similar hardware. The pocketable box helps you visualize the signals and voltages from your music-making gear (up to four signals at once), tune inputs, analyze spectrums or generate dual waveforms. You can generate the exact sound you want rather than having to play it by ear. The device runs on either battery power or USB-C, and the DIY design practically begs for customization.
The bundle is a limited edition, and will be available soon for $230 through retailers like B&H. That’s not trivial if you’re just getting started on music creation, but might be easy to justify if you’re hoping to elevate your production skills — and find something to read during your downtime.
Starting tomorrow, YouTube will give both fans and creators the ability to gift paid channel subscriptions. A number of influential streamers tweeted the announcement today, many of whom were ecstatic about a new monetization tool. Gifted subs have been a popular feature on Twitch — YouTube Gaming’s main rival— for a while. Many streamers see subscriptions as an easy way to generate revenue while also building their community. But YouTube has dragged its heels on releasing the much-anticipated feature for some time. Finally, YouTube Japan tested the waters with gifted memberships earlier this year for a select number of channels. Gifted memberships — which is still in beta — will now be available to all YouTube Gaming users in the US and UK.
Excited to announce that starting May 11th, memberships Gifting Beta will be enabled for YouTube streams!
Been streaming on YouTube for 2.5 years and just so happy to see the platform continue to focus working on improving the streaming side of it. Many more changes to come 🙂
Fans normally pay $4.99 per month for channel memberships, which allow them to access user badges, emotes and other exclusive content by their favorite creators. YouTube Gaming has released a number of other Twitch-like features this year, such as Live Redirects, which allow streamers to send fans to other streams or premieres.
While Twitch remains the biggest US-based platform for livestreaming, a number of its high-profile streamers have decamped in recent years for YouTube Gaming. And there may be more to follow. Bloomberg reported last month that Twitch partners will get a smaller cut of revenue from subscriptions (50 percent from 70 percent) under a new monetization model by the Amazon-owned platform. YouTube Gaming takes only 30 percent of a streamer’s revenue from channel subscriptions. While YouTube Gaming doesn’t have as big of an audience as Twitch, that could easily change if more popular Twitch creators leave for greener pastures.
Meta has revealed more of how NFTs will work on Instagram. In the US-based test, you can show what you’ve bought or created for free by connecting your Instagram account to a compatible digital wallet and posting for the world to see. If you like, the social network can automatically tag both creator and collector using public blockchain data. You can display info like a description, too. And yes, as mentioned, NFTs will shimmer to help you flaunt your art collection.
Instagram will initially support wallets from MetaMask, Rainbow and Trust Wallet. Coinbase, Dapper and Phantom are “coming soon.” Public data will come from Ethereum and Polygon at first, with the previously promised Flow and Solana support arriving in the near future.
The social site also stressed that NFTs were still subject to community rules. It was also aware that NFTs, like cryptocurrency and other blockchain products, can be harmful to the environment. The company hoped to offset the CO2 emissions from displaying digital artwork by purchasing renewable energy.
Meta will expand NFT support to Facebook, and will let Instagram users display their pieces as augmented reality stickers in Stories. There will be “additional features” for both creators and collectors, the company added. Whether you think NFTs are fads or permanent fixtures, it’s clear Meta will be invested them for a while as it builds out its vision of the metaverse.
Yesterday, as Russia celebrated Victory Day, marking its role in defeating Nazi Germany, many of the country’s online platforms were defaced in protest of the ongoing war in Ukraine.
According to reports, Russians with smart TVs saw channel listings replaced with a message implicating them in the ongoing conflict. “The blood of thousands of Ukrainians and hundreds of murdered children is on your hands,” the message read. “TV and authorities are lying. No to war.”
According to The Washington Post, the hack apparently targeted several of the country’s largest internet companies, including Yandex and Rutube, Russia’s alternative to YouTube.
Russia passed a law this year that bans any efforts to discredit the country’s military, but that hasn’t stopped some media outlets from protesting the war. Articles on Lenta.ru noted they had “not been agreed with the editorial leadership” and that “the Presidential Administration will punish the publication for publishing this.”
It only sold two million last quarter, confirming Sony hasn’t overcome its supply issues.
Engadget
Sony announced it sold just two million PlayStation 5 units last quarter (Q4), bringing its overall total to 19.3 million. That’s down considerably on the same quarter last year when it sold 3.3 million units. Game sales went up, though, with 70.5 million PS4/PS5 titles sold compared to 61.4 million a year ago.
While Sony contends with supply constraints, it’s expecting better days ahead. It forecast a 34 percent increase in sales next quarter to 929 billion yen ($7.13 billion) due to better parts supply and higher sales of third-party games. Sony is also launching PlayStation Plus Extra and Premium, its take on Xbox Game pass, in June. While PS Plus subscriber levels were flat, the new tiers could help draw more subscribers — and some might pay more than they do right now.
Kendrick Lamar’s new music video for The Heart Part 5 revolves exclusively around deepfake celebrity faces superimposed on Kendrick’s body as he raps across topics including mental illness, murder and more.
Lincoln College was unable to access recruitment and fundraising systems for months.
Lincoln College says it will close this week in the wake of a ransomware attack that took months to resolve. While the impact of COVID-19 severely impacted recruitment and fundraising, the cyberattack seems to have been the tipping point for the Illinois institution.
Lincoln says it had “record-breaking student enrollment” in fall 2019. However, the pandemic caused a sizable fall in numbers. The college — one of only a few rural schools to qualify as a predominantly Black institution under the Department of Education — said it affected its financial standing. Barring a last-minute respite, the combination of the pandemic and cyberattack may have brought an end to the 157-year-old institution.
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg says they’re on the way to Facebook as well.
As promised (or threatened), NFTs are coming to Instagram. Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said the app will this week start testing a way for users to display non-fungible tokens on their profiles.
“We’re starting building for NFTs, not just in our metaverse and Reality Labs work but also across our family of apps.” Zuckerberg said in a post on Facebook. “We’re starting to test digital collectibles on Instagram so that creators and collectors can display their NFTs.”
A similar feature is coming to Facebook in the near future, and Meta is considering enabling NFTs in its other apps, such as Messenger and WhatsApp. Also in the works is a way for people to display 3D NFTs in Instagram Stories using augmented reality.
Paramount+ has released the first trailer for Players, its long-awaited League of Legends mockumentary from American Vandal creators Dan Perrault and Tony Yacenda. Set to debut on June 16th, the series centers on Fugitive Gaming, a fictional pro t…
Electronic Arts is stepping back into Middle-earth. The publisher has announced a free-to-play mobile game called The Lord of the Rings: Heroes of Middle-earth. The RPG is the first EA mobile title based on J.R.R. Tolkien’s works. EA Capital Games is developing the game. The studio was behind another successful collectible mobile RPG in 2015’s Star Wars: Galaxy of Heroes.
Heroes of Middle-earth will include characters from both The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit, along with collection systems, turn-based combat and “immersive storytelling.” EA said in a press release that players will experience “iconic stories from the world of Tolkien and take up the fight against the great evils of Middle-earth.” Unsurprisingly, given that this is a free-to-play mobile title, there will be microtransactions.
“We are incredibly excited to partner with The Saul Zaentz Company and Middle-earth Enterprises on the next generation of mobile role-playing games,” said EA’s vice-president of mobile RPG Malachi Boyle said. “The team is filled with fans of The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit and each day they bring their tremendous passion and talents together to deliver an authentic experience for players. The combination of high-fidelity graphics, cinematic animations, and stylized art immerses players in the fantasy of Middle-earth where they’ll go head-to-head with their favorite characters.”
This will be EA’s first LOTR title since 2009’s The Lord of the Rings: Conquest, as Polygon notes. Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment, NetEase and Glu Mobile (which EA bought last year) are among the other publishers who have released mobile LOTR games.
EA expects to start limited regional beta tests of The Lord of the Rings: Heroes of Middle-earth this summer.
As promised (or threatened, depending on your perspective), NFTs are coming to Instagram imminently. Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said the app will this week start testing a way for users to display non-fungible tokens on their profiles.
Mark Zuckerberg just announced that we’re testing digital collectibles for creators and collectors to showcase NFTs on Instagram. NFTs allow creators to take control over their work, fanbase and income. Oh and they ✨shimmer✨https://t.co/gwCW0CiR3Mpic.twitter.com/wraSdWvgLf
“We’re starting building for NFTs, not just in our metaverse and Reality Labs work, but also across our family of apps.” Zuckerberg said in a post on Facebook. “We’re starting to test digital collectibles on Instagram so that creators and collectors can display their NFTs.”
A similar feature is coming to Facebook in the near future, and Meta is considering enabling NFTs in its other apps, such as Messenger and WhatsApp. Also in the works is a way for people to display 3D NFTs in Instagram Stories using augmented reality. Zuckerberg says this feature would be built on Spark AR and would allow users to “place digital art in physical spaces.”
Rumors swirled over the weekend suggesting that Instagram would start testing non-fungible tokens in the app this week. CoinDesk reported that Meta would allow integrations with NFTs from the Ethereum, Polygon, Solana and Flow blockchains.
NFTs on Instagram 🎉
This week we’re beginning to test digital collectibles with a handful of US creators and collectors who will be able to share NFTs on Instagram. There will be no fees associated with posting or sharing a digital collectible on IG.
Instagram head Adam Mosseri shed more light on how the NFT integrations will work. Users will be able to share NFTs they’ve created or bought in their feed, Stories and messages. A limited number of people in the US will have access to these features to begin with.
Mosseri also noted the disconnect between the decentralized nature of Web3 tech like NFTs and the blockchain and the fact Instagram is a centralized platform. “One of the reasons why we’re starting small is we want to make sure that we can learn from the community,” he added. “We want to make sure we can work out how to embrace those tenets of distributed trust and distributed power, despite the fact that we are a centralized platform.”
Users won’t need to pay any fees “associated with posting or sharing a digital collectible” on Instagram, Mosseri said. In his announcement, he suggested NFTs could provide a way for a subset of creators to earn a living on the platform. That suggests users will be able to buy and sell them directly on Instagram at some point. Zuckerberg has said that creators may eventually be able to mint NFTs in the app too. Engadget has contacted Meta for more details.
Meta’s CEO has also spoken about other ambitions for NFTs in the company’s take on the metaverse. “I would hope that you know, the clothing that your avatar is wearing in the metaverse, you know, can be basically minted as an NFT and you can take it between your different places,” he said at SXSW in March.
Update 5/9 10:52AM ET: Added more details from Mosseri.
Kendrick Lamar is out to show that deepfakes are useful for more than misinformation and creepy porn. The rapper has shared a music video for his “The Heart Part 5” single that revolves exclusively around deepfake celebrity faces superimposed on Kendrick’s body as he spits bars. The clip seamlessly transitions between AI-based visages of famous and occasionally notorious figures in recent Black culture, including Kanye West, OJ Simpson, Will Smith and late icons like Kobe Bryant and Nipsey Hussle.
Deep Voodoo, a studio formed by South Park creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone, was responsible for the deepfake imagery. The video was directed by Kendrick and Dave Free.
As with the lyrics themselves, the overlaid faces serve as commentary on the Black experience. They represent different aspects of a common voice, and appear alongside key verses (such as Kanye for bipolar disorder, and Nipsey for murder). In that sense, Kendrick’s video is a reminder that deepfake technology is just a tool, and can be useful for artistic expression in the right hands.
If you’ve ever wished your podcast audio was just a bit more immersive, you’re in luck. Well, you’re in luck as long as you’re a Wondery+ subscriber. Dolby and Wondery have announced that the Amazon-owned podcast studio will be the first platform in the United States to offer shows in Dolby Atmos. Starting today, Blood Ties, Jacked: Rise of the New Jack Sound and Iowa Chapman and The Last Dog can be streamed with the immersive audio. Wondery plans to offer Against the Odds in the format “in the coming months.”
Dolby Atmos episodes and shows are exclusive to Wondery’s podcast subscription Wondery+. The $5 monthly or $35 annual plan gives you access to the company’s full catalog of content without ads. Subscribers also get exclusive episodes. Although Wondery is the first US-based podcast studio to offer Dolby Atmos, the immersive audio will be available in 28 countries where the service is available.
Dolby says it’s “actively working” with other platforms to add more podcasts in Atmos audio. Currently, the company has partnered with Earshot in India and Anghami in the Middle East and North Africa on the initiative. So if Wondery’s catalog doesn’t entice you, more shows from other networks should be available in the future.
Amazon bought Wondery in late 2020, shortly after it added podcasts to Amazon Music. The podcast studio had already made a name for itself with shows like Blood Ties and Dying for Sex, and it had launched its subscription service that offered ad-free listening. Amazon and Wondery have lined up other perks for paying users too, like the ability to listen to Guy Raz’s How I Built This a week early.
