Fast Company

On March 8, the New York Times unveiled a new app called NYT Now that signals a major shift in how publishers package the news.

For $8 a month, NYT Now will offer users access to a limited number of stories, and those stories will be presented in a totally new way (for the Times, that is): as a series of cards, one per story, with an image and, at most, two bullet points summing up the news.

Samsung has developed a smartphone case that helps the visually impaired by enhancing their awareness of their surroundings. The Ultrasonic Cover for its Galaxy Core Advance smartphone helps owners sense the presence of people and objects up to two meters away.

[Commentary] For all the press attention directed at Comcast's recently announced bid to acquire Time Warner Cable, the merger's greatest long-term impact has been largely overlooked.

We tend to think of Comcast as a purveyor of cable TV first and foremost, and this may explain why media coverage of the merger tends to focus on the familiar dangers of letting a monopoly take control of an entertainment market with millions of customers, worth billions of dollars. While I don't want to undersell this concern, an equally pressing issue is that the merger places control over much of the country’s high-speed broadband with one media company.

In the short run, this keeps the cost of online access artificially high for US consumers, and inhibits improvements in service; in the long run, it could very well stifle digital innovation. As digital offerings move from entertainment to fundamental function, they become tools that cannot go down, or all hell breaks loose. An adaptive home security system that you can control from your smartphone is a great idea, unless you have to worry about exceeding your data cap -- or watch your access grind to a halt because everyone’s streaming the new House of Cards.

The companies that develop these applications know this too, and that uncertainty makes such innovation a bad investment. Mergers like this make it clear that we're still regulating broadband like entertainment, not like a utility, and this creates a bad environment for good design.

[Greco Design Director at Ziba, a design and innovation consultancy]

In a disaster, cell phone networks can be one of the first things to go. But cell phone networks don’t have to be confined to giant towers: The latest mobile network, from Vodafone Foundation, can fit in a backpack.

The network can’t reach very far, with a coverage area that’s only a 328-foot radius. But it’s strong enough for relief workers in a temporary office to send thousands of text messages, and make five simultaneous calls. For people who rely on their phone for banking, the device can also provide access to money. If electricity is out in the area -- a likely scenario -- the device can be charged with solar power or a car cigarette lighter.