Buttons is a “blind camera” that instantly retrieves an image online uploaded by someone else.

New Scientist has published a thought-provoking article which explores the fragile nature of the materials and devices we entrust with storing our data.

Researchers at Vanderbuilt University have conducted experiments which explore ways of filtering information.

Perfect visual memory may become commonplace if new research pans out. A group of Spanish researchers has discovered a substance that could radically enhance visual recall. The group found that if they increased production of a protein called RGS-14 in the area of the visual cortex in mice, it significantly helped their ability to remember objects they’ve seen. With the RGS-14 boost, mice could remember objects they had seen for up to two months – normally, their object recall only lasts about an hour. It remains to be seen if the RGS-14 boost will assist visual memory recall in humans, [...]

Looking to create a kind of virtual physical space that would evoke specific memories of the past, Scott Wayne Indiana used masking tape to draw a scale floor-plan of his childhood house. After recreating the house’s outline on a grass lawn in Central Park, Indiana was flooded with detailed recollections of his youth. An interesting art project that illustrates the power of simple cues to conjure up memories and emotions.
Memory Lane
[via Wooster Collective]

Sam Anderson has a wonderful article in New York Magazine that examines our modern culture of multi-tasking. He explores both sides of the attention spectrum from continuous partial attention to executive focus, and concludes that maybe all this distraction we’re experiencing is not all that bad. It’s a long (by internet standards) but worthwhile read.
Anderson on the benefits of distraction:
The prophets of total attentional meltdown sometimes invoke, as an example of the great culture we’re going to lose as we succumb to e-thinking, the canonical French juggernaut Marcel Proust. And indeed, at seven volumes, several thousand pages, and 1.5 million [...]