Tag: technology

• From watchtowers to cellphone towers: the origins of “alert” and “alarm”

  It wasn’t just alarm clocks that went off on New York City cellphones Monday morning. Another noise also pealed: emergency alerts. The message, which The New York Times reports may be the first of its kind, was “an electronic wanted poster” for the since-arrested suspect of recent bombings in the area. Alerts and alarms haven’t just haven’t advanced in technology,…

  John Kelly

  September 20, 2016

  Uncategorized

• Why do we call them headphone “jacks”?

  Apple turned many heads this week when it announced it’s scrapping the headphone jack in the iPhone 7. The jack, that little socket you plug your headphones into and sometimes the word for the plug itself, has had a good run: It’s a durable bit of technology dating back to the 19th century. But why…

  John Kelly

  September 9, 2016

  Uncategorized

• If you’re a language lover, you should be obsessed with “Pokémon”

  Days after its release, Nintendo’s Pokémon Go, a free mobile augmented reality app, has become nothing short of a worldwide phenomenon. The game maps its cute, battling Pokémon characters onto the real world, which is already causing a host of real-world disruptions. But gamers, technophiles, and Pokémon fanatics aren’t the only ones who should be…

  John Kelly

  July 12, 2016

  Feature

• Cyber

  If you’re reading this at work, at least your boss won’t be catching you shopping. Yes, it’s Cyber Monday, the Internet’s Black Friday. This online retail event was created by some very smart marketers in 2005. The word cyber was created, too, in its own way, by a very smart person and not too long ago. But its etymological…

  John Kelly

  November 30, 2015

  Uncategorized

• virus

  For so many of us, a virus might spell the end of our computer–not our lives, as we are witnessing so tragically in the Ebola outbreak in West Africa. Sometimes a viral video is precisely what is needed to distract us from today’s feverish crises. Too often, though, a viral video may be distracting us from them. But…

  John Kelly

  August 5, 2014

  Uncategorized