Technology • Innovation • Publishing — Issue #177

Innovation

A Glasgow nightclub is installing technology that will turn dancers’ body heat into renewable energy, which will then be used to heat or cool the club — www.nytimes.com 
The power of dance? It’s literal at a Glasgow arts center that is installing a geothermal heating and cooling system that runs on heat from dancing bodies.

Meta AI Research Animates Your Drawings

sketch.metademolab.com

Bring children’s drawings to life, by animating characters to move around! #AI

Fractal: 110K join Discord of Twitch founder’s new NFT gaming marketplace

cointelegraph.com

Fractal, the freshly launched NFT gaming marketplace from Justin Kan, attracted more than 111,000 Discord members within two weeks of its announcement. #NFTs

Will music NFTs ever get their PFP moment?

www.waterandmusic.com 
2021 has seen a flurry of new generative music NFT project launches, but they have yet to see the same consumer demand or financial upside as their immensely popular visual counterparts.

Technology

McKinsey projects IoT products worth up to $12.6 trillion by 2030

www.axios.com

But high-end estimates will depend on interoperability and cybersecurity. #IoT

Axie Infinity: Infinite Opportunity or Infinite Peril? — www.deconstructoroffun.com

Axie Infinity is the poster child of blockchain games. Yet under all the hype, there are some fundamental issues that can bring the game down if gone unfixed. #gaming

U.S. Probes Potential of Drivers Playing Video Games in Teslas — cheddar.com

The U.S. has opened a formal investigation into the potential for Tesla drivers to play video games on a center touch screen while the vehicle is in motion.

Marketplaces Year in Review 2021

www.marketplacepulse.com

2021 was the year of broken supply chains, Amazon aggregators, more advertising, Shopify’s almost-marketplace, and one unanswered question — did the pandemic boost e-commerce after all? For now, the world of marketplaces revolves around Amazon — it has doubled in size in two years. No one will challenge it directly, but a different paradigm might. #ecommerce

Publishing & Media

Takeaways and Trends from 2021 — insights.netgalley.com

MT @glecharles This combo 2021 trends + highlights from the excellent @BookSmartsPod on @NetGalley is a great read. It was an interesting year in this bonkers industry, and 2022 should be even more so.

‘A For-Profit Company Is Trying to Privatize as Many Public Libraries as They Can’

fair.org

“There’s just a lot of potential for the information loop to be a closed loop that’s controlled by one company.” #libraries

Works Entering the Public Domain in 2022 — web.law.duke.edu

Still looking for that picture book you loved as a kid? Try asking Instagram

www.npr.org 
Some people spend years or longer trying to track down favorite books from childhood. An Instagram account called My Old Books uses crowdsourcing to make the connection.

Hot Pod 2022 predictions: The next year in podcasting

www.theverge.com

MT @mediagazer Hot Pod’s 2022 podcast predictions: Facebook hosts and monetizes podcasts, fewer exclusive show deals, affiliate revenue growth, standardized salaries, and more by @ashleyrcarman and @braccisaurus.

Resources & Opportunities

Judges Needed for the Windows & Mirrors Scholarship Awards

docs.google.com

HT @FedericoErebia

Widening the Pipeline 2022 Fellowship — National Press Foundation— nationalpress.org

MT @NatPress .@NatPress will recruit up to 25 young journalists of color for a 12-month #fellowship in #leadership, in-depth #reporting#data + #multimedia skills needed to hold govt’s + corporations accountable + advance in newsrooms. #NPFWidening