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I’m looking for interesting essays about advertising, especially but not solely in the context of the ad-supported web. [more inside]
posted by elanid at 8:48 PM - 7 answers

Surprisingly hard to find: I'd like a few wireless, battery powered buttons to install in several rooms in the house so my kid can ping me or my spouse while we are working in the yard etc. [more inside]
posted by splitpeasoup at 12:04 PM - 10 answers

I have a 2012 Retina MacBookPro that works fine except the built-in wifi is so out of date/spec that it hogs spectrum and makes other devices take a shit. I have a nice shiny new 801.11/ac USB wifi adapter that I want to use instead of the built in hardware. [more inside]
posted by seanmpuckett at 12:26 PM - 7 answers

How did Henrik Kniberg create the graphics for the Youtube video: Spotify Engineering Culture - Part 1? The animation of an artist illustrating with the voice over is very interesting.
posted by GernBlandston at 11:51 AM - 3 answers

Do you know any instances where two people of varying price/entry fees are matched together in any other implementation (game/real world/match.com etc)? Something like I am staking / risking something different than you, but we are being matched. Or I am entering a tournament/battle/game/system at a different price/risk & you/others are doing it at different price/risk. The outcome can be different (dependent on my input) or same (independent of input). It would really help if someone know of any instances of these.
posted by foraman at 10:33 PM - 6 answers

Is there a website/app that would allow me to set up and populate a tournament-style bracket (best candy bars, 80's baseball names, etc), and then have participants (either via website or app) pick the "winners" of each matchup via a live on-screen poll, and then pick the winners of each subsequent round to determine an ultimate winner? I'm picturing a similar setup to poll anywhere, where each participant votes on their phone and the results show up on the screen, updating a bracket as we go.
posted by ericbop at 12:55 PM - 0 answers

I told my editor about Whisper, and she sounded skeptical because Whisper uses open AI. I really don't understand anything about any of this, so can you explain to me so I can explain to her how Whisper is privacy-safe? Or is there something I need to do on my end, beyond just downloading Whisper to MAKE it safe? Again, I'm not knowledgeable about this stuff, & I just have a basic Macbook. Thanks.!
posted by gigondas at 9:06 AM - 7 answers

Any recommendations for a good flatbed scanner? I would use it to scan color images for use in digital collages, so mostly 8.5 x 11 inches max at about 600 dpi. Looking to spend $100-200. Thanks!
posted by Fister Roboto at 11:23 AM - 8 answers

I'm a writer and I often conduct interviews and then want them transcribed. These are just for me, so I can pull quotes from them, etc, so the transcriptions don't have to be neat or perfect. But now I'm concerned about privacy, and want to know the best options for preserving confidentiality. [more inside]
posted by gigondas at 9:29 AM - 9 answers

What's your advice for buying a decent printer for printing out photographs? I've had some interest from people in buying prints of some of my travel / architecture photos but know nothing about printers and what's involved. What should I be looking for and what costs are expected in the long run. I mostly take pictures of buildings and nature (self links). Never really people. I'm on a Mac / iPhone. I already have a b&w laser printer for non-photographs so it won't need to fill that job.
posted by dobbs at 6:29 AM - 7 answers

At work I often get varied requests with tight deadlines. As in “get this case study done today.” Or “create a presentation on this.” We usually have a large corpus of material that follow a similar pattern and language. I know how to take a model and train a dataset, but is there a way I can skip that upload 300 documents, write a one pager outline and prompt it to make it sound like the rest? [more inside]
posted by geoff. at 8:26 AM - 10 answers

I have a 1976 Sansui AU-9500 stereo amp with a TU-9500 tuner (and a Thorens TD-160). They’re the ones I grew up on (my dads), original everything including manuals and purchase receipt. I want to take it in for clean up and repair and need advice. [more inside]
posted by rubatan at 12:44 PM - 8 answers

I just got the pixel 7 a year ago but I'm tempted, largely because I'll be visiting beautiful landscapes this summer and I think the camera on the pixel 8 pro might be a lot better. Is this foolish? Are there other reasons to upgrade after only a year?
posted by janey47 at 6:04 PM - 2 answers

I am at my wit's end having spent a lot of time searching for an answer, and hoping someone here can help me find missing text messages. [more inside]
posted by Ensign at 3:59 PM - 4 answers

Hello! We just moved from a studio apartment to a much larger space. I think I need a wifi extender/mesh/thing, but I am lost! Help! [more inside]
posted by something_witty at 1:35 PM - 11 answers

Help us! My area has a need for a very specific polling/scheduling function. We need two things. Allow participants to pick a day of the week, and allow only some number of responses for any one day. [more inside]
posted by lillygog at 11:10 AM - 2 answers

I have a mic with a mini XLR to 3.5 mm TS cable, which is currently plugged in to a USB audio card with TSR jack. It only works when it's pulled out a little bit. What's the easiest way to get it to work while fully plugged in - new audio card, new cable, or can I buy a converter jack? [more inside]
posted by one_bean at 10:47 AM - 9 answers

The Apple Watch can send signals by bluetooth (audio, for instance), but can it receive bluetooth signals? Is it possible to build a trigger that when pressed makes the watch do something like play a sound or change screens or whatever? Are there any examples of such a thing on the market?
posted by dobbs at 3:36 PM - 8 answers

I want to find a specific kind of sleeve for my new MacBook air. [more inside]
posted by 1970s Antihero at 12:39 PM - 4 answers

I have a TON of photos in Google Drive but I just discovered that Amazon Prime has free unlimited storage so I'd like to move things there. I don't want to have to download and upload them to get them there. Have you moved photos like this using an online service (e.g. MultCloud)? What worked for you and what didn't?
posted by GernBlandston at 8:39 AM - 3 answers