THE NEXT BIG THING?

Say hello to the new smart speaker, said Liz Stinson in Wired​.com. While “hardware’s functionalities are often frozen on the production line,” a German company called Binauric has developed a Bluetooth-enabled speaker called Boom Boom that allows users to add new features over time. Out of the box, the polygonal speaker has all the basics: audio playback, conference calling, multispeaker syncing. But Boom Boom also comes with “an accelerometer, light sensors, and microphones that allow the device to take on new functionalities,” such as recording, through apps. Binauric hopes that users take advantage of these technologies to manipulate the device so “that someday the Boom Boom might not just play music, but make it too.” For instance, users could move or shake the device and trigger the accelerometer to manipulate the rhythm or tempo of songs and create new sounds.