The Ashley Madison Hackpocalypse shows no signs of fading away, Google has brought back its Map Maker tool (now with adult supervision) and the Japanese have sent whiskey into space. J.D. and El Kaiser march through these stories and more in the weekly roundup of geek news.
Technology has changed many aspects of daily life — including how we express ourselves through music, art, photography and more. Laura M. Holson drops by to discuss how people are finding outlets for their creativity with mobile apps. If you want to play along at home, check these out:
• DubSmash lets you lip-sync the hits in Vine-like clips. (Check out how much fun the the stars of Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D and Agent Carter had with the app this summer — and now there’s even a contest for charity brewing.) Oh, and it’s free for Android and iOS.
• GarageBand is music-making software for OS X and iOS and even if you don’t know the first thing about multitrack recording or writing your own songs, you’ll learn fast with this gem of a program. It’s $5 if it didn’t already come on your device and the help guide can be, well, helpful.
• Paper By FiftyThree is a free drawing, sketching and brainstorming app for the iPad.
• Frontback uses your smartphone’s front and rear cameras to take two images that are then shared as a single photo or video. It’s free for Android and iOS.
• Disney Frozen: Story Theater lets you create your own stories using characters and props from Disney’s unstoppable 2013 animated ice-princes film. (Yeah, good luck getting THAT SONG out of your head now.) The app is $5 for the iOS device of your choice, but that doesn’t mean it’s ad-free, as a disclaimer on the site warns: Before you download this experience, please consider that this app contains advertising for the Walt Disney Family of Companies.
• Buddha Board goes beyond the mobile app and lets you get the Zen with a $35 piece of hardware designed to let you live in the moment.
