We've noticed a meme traveling around Twitter lately that seems to be making people's days at the office a little more fun. Or, depending on how you look at it, making their coworkers' days just a little more annoying. What is this life-changing trend? Old-school sound effects buttons.
If you need a drummer to punctuate all your snappy remarks, like some kind of quirky late-night talk show host, visit Instant Rim Shot. If something doesn't quite go as planned for you or someone in the room with you, go to Sad Trombone. These are perhaps the two most indispensable sound effects in any jokester's repertoire.
Safari users, take note: this is where you finally get some use out of that Web Clip feature, so you can keep these in your Dashboard for the appropriate occasion. We hope you enjoy them -- or loathe them -- as much as we do.
Want to send a friend an audio file, but don't know if they've got an audio player that can handle your OGG files? You could point them to the appropriate player and codec combo, or you could just make the file an executable. Audio/Video to Exe is a utility that lets you turn pretty much any audio file into a standalone media player.
The player is probably the simplest you've ever seen. There are no controls for play/pause or fast forward/rewind. In fact there are no controls at all. If you want the file to stop playing, you just close the program. But the media you create should be playable on any PC.
You can also use the program to convert files from one format to another. It can handle a wide array of audio and video formats, including 3GP, AAC, FLAC, MP2/3/4, OGG, and WAV, and WMA, WMV, FLV, SWF, ASF, and MOV. Audio/Video to Exe is available as a free download. Or you can buy the Pro version, which lets you adjust bit rates, for $32.27.
We'd never, ever turn down a good ghost story. Aliens, even the abducting kind (especially the abducting kind!) are incredibly cool. Still, we are pretty sure that T. Rex existed and didn't use those huge incisors for gnashing hellaciously into cantaloupes and mangoes. And we have enough acquaintances who act a little too similarly to lower primates to believe Darwin was too terribly far off.
We really dig people who can talk about the Drake Equation. We dig people who can speak articulately about science, sound extra intelligent, and still be accessible enough that we are able to follow along.
Scientific podcasts are a funny thing. There are many out there that remind us way too much of our college days when we sat for two or three hours in a hot lecture hall listening to a professor full of even hotter air drone on about weather patterns. But there are gems like The Skeptic's Guide, which feel much more like you're sitting a table in a restaurant having a conversation with your smartest friends.
And these guys (and girls!) are smart. The host, Dr. Stephen Novella, is a neurologist teaching at Yale Medical School. Rebecca Watson is the resident Skepchick on the panel, and has the unique claim to fame that there's an asteroid named after her. Jay and Robert Novella are regular contributors and leaders in the New England Skeptical Society. And the weekly guest, James Randi, is the most interesting of the bunch: He's a magician. He's a world famous escape artist. And he's ready to expose, explain, and share with the layman the very scientific explanations for the magical things that go on in the paranormal and pseudoscientific world.
The Skeptic's Guide to the Universe is available from their site, or through iTunes.
Chances are, if you've searched the web for a universal video converter for the Mac, you've come across VisualHub (formerly iSquint). Now, the makers of VisualHub have brought the same conversion magic to audio with AudialHub version 1.0.
AudialHub can easily convert audio files to most any format of your choosing, including AAC, MP3, WMA, AIFF, WAV, Apple Lossless, 3G (cell phones), Ogg Vorbis, FLAC, and Audio and MP3 CDs.
AudialHub brings the same simplicity-and optional advanced features-that VisualHub offers. If you want to use AudialHub for quick and dirty conversions, simply drop in some audio files, choose the output format, and hit start. That's it!
If you want more advanced conversion, you can look into the advanced settings, where you can set bitrate and channel, trim the audio file, add tags and comments, etc...
AudialHub also offers a Quick Preview capability, so you can instantly preview compression quality and trim settings before you convert. AudialHub also supports simultaneous conversions in separate queues, each with their own setting.
AudialHub is currently offered with a free trial; after that, it'll cost you $18.81 (you get a $4 discount if you're a current owner of VisualHub). AudialHub requires Mac OS 10.4.11 or later.
New York City hipsters have struck again, bringing quick and easy mixtape sharing to the 'net at Muxtape.com. The site was built by Justin Ouellette, and early mixes have been uploaded by Jakob Lodwick (of Vimeo) and Patrick Moberg (of nygirlofmydreams.com fame). Muxtape is easy as pie: upload songs in mp3 format, drag and drop to organize, send the link to your friends.
Muxtapes hold up to 12 songs in a nice minimal layout (LARGE TYPE! CLICK TO PLAY! CLICK AGAIN TO STOP!). You can't download songs directly from other people's Muxtapes, which keeps the focus on finding good new artists to support. Justin says RSS feeds and m4a support are already in the works, so Muxtape should just keep getting easier.
MediaInfo Mac is a Mac utility for displaying information about audio and video files. Similar to GSpot for Windows, MediaInfo can provide codec information, bit rate, resolution, frame rate, and aspect ratio.
The program displays a URL to the codec used (in case you don't have a capable player), and you can export all of the information to a text file.
If you open a file in VLC and press Apple+I ("Get Info"), you can get similar (though limited) functionality by clicking the "Advanced Information" tab.
In this day and age, who has time for reading? You don't -- obviously. There's this site out there called PimpMyNews and it reads blogs aloud for you using text-to-speech software. You can even listen to the stories on an iPhone or iPod Touch through the site, and the service will even let you transfer stories onto your regular ol' iPod.
Despite being perfect for those too busy (lazy?) to read blogs, the site could also work in favor of the blind and others unable to read regular text. And for the skeptics: the text-to-speech software does a surprisingly decent job at being very understandable and comfortable enough to listen to, but others may be annoyed by the non-human elements in the the voice.
Like podcasting? Like sex? Like not being spoken to as if you're slightly more intelligent than a paramecium? If you answered "yes" to all three of those questions, here are some podcasts you might enjoy.
(Warning to readers. This column both acknowledges the existence of sex, and explores the ways sex and sexuality relate to and are enhanced by the internet. If you're offended by such content, don't take the jump.)
Last Sunday we told you about a way for listeners outside of the US to tune in to Pandora without having to deal with proxies: GlobalPandora. We also predicted that it will get shut down - but who would have thought so soon? It looks like the real Pandora decided to block all the U.S. IPs that GlobalPandora was using.
On the site, there's no hint that GlobalPandora is planning on making a comeback besides asking if anyone has "access to U.S. servers or U.S. shells." So unless there are some friendlies out there that will support GlobalPandora, the box will remain shut unless you mind setting up your own proxy.
And if you don't want to deal with a proxy, despite Pandora being as fascinating as it is, there is a nice selection of other online radio alternatives that might work for users outside of the U.S. - a number of which GlobalPandora has been good enough to list on it's "we're down" page.
Podcasts are unruly things. There are millions of them out there, and only a small percentage interest you. An even smaller percentage are actually worth listening to. You've got to search them out, add them to your aggregator, or download them to your computer or device. Not particularly difficult, but not particularly convenient, either.
We've taken some time to play with the Mediafly podcast/vodcast search and delivery service. We'd describe Mediafly as part search engine, part social network, part delivery service, with a healthy dose of Amazon-esque recommendation thrown in. It's still in beta, and where there's definitely some work left to be done, it's shaping up to be a service with promise.
Describing Mediafly is hard. Using it is considerably easier.
Three little letters, about a year ago, had a death-grip on the music industry: DRM. Seriously, who thought this was a good idea? DRM limits the unauthorized copying and sharing of music. We can see that argument. It also limits what music can be played on certain devices. Should you get a new computer or device and need to transfer your licenses, all we can say is -- good luck with that. We speak from experience.
Recently record labels and at least a few online music sellers have moved away from offering DRM-laden music. And today, Napster announced it was making the move to DRM-free downloads. (The company's subscription service still includes DRM) Napster, the service that once offered DRM-free songs (illegally), and then legally sold DRM'd songs, has been reborn into the service it should have been all along -- legal music, DRM-free.
Moving to the MP3 format opens up Napster to a wider array of devices, including the ubiquitous iPod. We're not financial gurus, but we sense this can only mean good things for Napster, and for the music industry as a whole. Music that we can play on any device we might have, on any computer we might have? We might break our music boycott. We might even have the heart to upgrade the circa 2004 Zen Touch to something new. You know, now that we can actually own our music, and not just rent it for the life of the device.
For new users, learning to use music composition software can be a daunting task. As programs become more powerful and feature rich, it gets more difficult to find applications that one can immediately pick up and play with.
Enter Hydrogen. As intuitive as it is powerful, this gem of Open Source Software enables anyone from the casual tinkerer to the seasoned professional to make great sounding beats. Once you're done making your magic, the piece can easily be exported as a WAV or MIDI file.
All you need to get started is a computer running Linux and some spare time. There is a Windows port available, but it is a year old. Check out the download page here.
The number one requested feature from Pandora users is the ability to Pandora-ize classical music, and well, it is here. For all you fans of the concerto, symphony, the sonata, and all the finer styles of music the world has to offer, Pandora has your audio fix ready to download into your ears in grand style.
As with all previous Pandora ideas, you can type in the name of your favorite composer to create a station. Hard to say at this point just how much classical music is available, because it takes a while to classify all that music using the near 400 point genome scale. You will simply need to check that out for yourself, and let us know how you like it.
Who said you need smoke, mirrors, lights, and fancy stage antics to get music that is sublime? Well, open Pandora's music box, and you'll see what is possible.
Meebo has just announced a new platform for their messaging system. This allows for third party developers to create applications based on the growing chat service.
The Meebo development platform launched with a set of API's that developers can grab in order to create multi user applications that Meebo users can specifically use to connect with each other. The question users must answer before the build, "I want to ______ with you. Before development begins, Meebo requires applications to be registered complete with title of application, descriptions and author's names. Special instructions and a key will then be sent out to get connected to the database. When the build is complete using either the supplied Flash or JavaScript starter files, applications will be tested in a sandbox environment before they are released to Meebo users. Developers aren't left in the shadows, Meebo will be selling advertising on the applications, and will be splitting revenue 50/50.
The two year old company is moving into the big time fast with their communication platform. They have also announced some big partnerships that allow video/audio calls (TokBox), voice chat (Pudding Media), group calling (TalkShoe), and live TV show streaming (UStream).
DivShare, which we have covered before, is not just another online storage site. It lets users upload and download unlimited files, and also well as offers a Facebook application and a power uploading tool. They have now released a no download web document viewer.
Even though we love downloads at Download Squad, keeping things online sure does have its remotely accessible benefits, and that's just what DivShare is doing with their flash based web document viewer. The new tool allows for viewing all types of documents from videos, photos and audio material anywhere. These documents can either be kept private, or embedded in websites, blogs or social networks.
Also released into the DivShare stables is a new iPhone app that allows for searching, downloading and emailing DivShare files straight from Apple's device. There will also be a few other specialty items getting released this week, including a Facebook collaboration tool, developer API and private label video players. If you haven't checked out what DivShare can offer your unlimited file storage needs, now could be the time.
We've noticed a meme traveling around Twitter lately that seems to be making people's days at the office a little more fun. Or, depending on how you look at it, making their coworkers' days just a little more annoying. What is this life-changing trend? Old-school sound effects buttons. 
MediaInfo Mac
Three little letters, about a year ago, had a death-grip on the music industry: DRM. Seriously, who thought this was a good idea? DRM limits the unauthorized copying and sharing of music. We can see that argument. It also limits what music can be played on certain devices. Should you get a new computer or device and need to transfer your licenses, all we can say is -- good luck with that. We speak from experience.
