9:24 PM CDT posted by Laura Hudson
# 
The police Command Center set up over half a block of 6th Street. After seeing what goes down on 6th Street at night after the crowds start drinking, I can’t say I’m surprised.
8:11 PM CDT posted by Ariel Zambelich
# On Congress Street, attached to chain link fencing surrounding a construction area, someone put up big chalkboards. On them is printed, “Before I die I want to ____________”
A young couple stopped to read it, and as the girl grabbed for chalk, she said, “I want to meet the love of my life!”
Her boyfriend responded, “Wait a second…. BABE! I thought that was ME?!”
Stay classy, SXSW.
8:02 PM CDT posted by Ariel Zambelich
# > “What are you running away from?!”
— Homeless man to a serious jogger on Congress Street
7:06 PM CDT posted by Angela Watercutter
# 
Shepard Fairey (left) at the construction of his mural in downtown Austin
6:34 PM CDT posted by Angela Watercutter
# > “Something that isn’t actually in the film that I was really fascinated by… came out of a conversation that we were having in Japan, where we were interviewing an adult film director … [It] was the concept of what they called the ‘video box.’ It was essentially like a combination drive-in/porn store booth. You could pull your car in and have your time with an adult video, rather than taking it home.”
— Josh Johnson, director of VHS documentary Rewind This!
6:29 PM CDT posted by Angela Watercutter
# 
Shepard Fairey painting a mural outside the Bittorrent party while the songs of Just Blaze and Young Guru hang in the air.
5:44 PM CDT posted by Ariel Zambelich
# > “My English is so bad, but my sound is PERFECT!”
— Jovanotti, onstage at the Waterloo Records SXSW 2013 day party
5:38 PM CDT posted by Brian Raftery
# At Wednesday afternoon’s BrooklynVegan party, London’s aptly named Savages played the sort of bristled, aggro-Anglo post-punk that tends to excite ’80s-raised Yanks such as myself — but without sounding at all like a throwback. Bonus points to frontwoman Jehnny Beth, who managed to not pass out from the heat, despite doing a series of karate air-chops while clad in a denim jacket.
4:59 PM CDT posted by Michael Calore
I stopped by the Sonos Studio, a cool little compound a few blocks from the SXSW craziness in downtown Austin. It’s a shady grove with a small outdoor stage and a generally mellow vibe. The company’s wireless speakers are set up everywhere, pumping out tunes from behind the landscaped palms and wooden lounge chairs.
In one of the bungalows in the back, the company is inviting guests to build their own speaker boxes. I tried my hand at it. You start with a speaker — Sonos has a big bucket of raw Play:3 drivers you can use.
You then trace a circle onto a cardboard box and cut a hole to slot the speaker into. I also cut two small holes in the back of my box to serve as bass ports. Then, you wire it up, attaching the positive and negative wires to the appropriate poles. Very simple.
Lastly, you mount the speaker to the box with hot glue (yes, it works just fine) and seal it all up with some duct tape. Pick any color you like.
My flight home is a concern. I wonder what TSA is going to think of this.
Sonos has a sound lab in the Los Angeles area where the company uses this workshop as a teaching tool for kids. They bring in students and show them how to build speakers out of really simple materials — cardboard boxes, balloons and styrofoam plates. The kids get to take home a completed speaker of their own design, and they hopefully also get excited enough about audio engineering to adopt it as a hobby, or even a profession.
4:28 PM CDT posted by Laura Hudson
# > “I was based in Kabul, which is the most progressive city in Afghanistan. It’s very young. If you meet anyone there, the first thing they want is to friend you on Facebook… Facebook is huge there. They don’t have a lot of mobile Internet yet and they don’t all have Internet at home, but they have Internet at work. So they all come to work an hour earlier and stay an hour later because they’re Facebooking.”
— Eva Orner, director of the documentary The Network about TOLO TV, the first television station in Afghanistan.
4:23 PM CDT posted by Michael Calore
# SoundCloud has set up shop at an ultra-modern concrete and glass structure by the river in downtown Austin. Next to the outdoor stage, there’s a boathouse and a big lawn, and it’s filled with people taking a breather, sipping water and just enjoying the sun — it’s in the mid-70s in Austin today, a nice change after a few days in the 50s.
The company’s SXSW headquarters has been dubbed the SoundCloud Creator Clubhouse — all the bands, DJs and electronic artists are SoundCloud users who post their songs or mixes on the audio publishing website. Most of the acts are emerging artists you’ve most likely never heard before, but there are some big names slated to show up on Wednesday night.
Check out the website and schedule at clubhouse.soundcloud.com or follow #CreatorClubhouse on the social media channel of your choice.
4:21 PM CDT posted by Ariel Zambelich
# Best out-of-context SXSW performance was by this beautiful man, rockin’ out at Trailer Space Records during the Burger Records/Trailer Space party.
And yes, to answer the question he asked the audience during the “set” – you did get a little sunburnt. But it was totally worth it.
3:49 PM CDT posted by Angela Watercutter
# The award for Coolest Keyboard goes to MS MR (aka the band from the latest Game of Thrones trailer) for this rad Korg.
1:07 PM CDT posted by Angela Watercutter
# Things one finds on their phone the morning after a night out during SXSW: This epic action shot of Kim Schifino of Matt & Kim crowd surfing (crowd dancing?) at the Fader Fort.
12:38 PM CDT posted by Michael Calore
# Ramen tutorial at East Side King, Austin TX
12:23 PM CDT posted by Mike Senese
Photo by Ariel Zambelich/Wired
Not far from the Texas State Capitol, a field of curious glowing light begs investigation. Passersby, on their way to meet with friends or bring their children home, pause and stare, then hurry toward the source of light. For hours, the crowds flow through.
In the middle of the grass, the groups congregate on an enormous installation of large illuminated “pucks” that, when stepped on, flash from an idle indigo to a soft pink. Starting at sunset and going late into the night, the creation transforms casual observers into animated and engaged revelers, causing grownups and kids alike to jump, stomp, run and cheer as they make the lights flicker and flash.
The creation, titled The Pool, is the work of Boulder, Colorado artist Jen Lewin, and it’s indicative of the “maker” concept that became a substantive presence at this year’s South by Southwest festival. From various tech installations like Lewin’s to four days of panels and meetups discussing hardware hacking, drone-making and everyone’s favorite current topic, 3-D printing, the event’s organizers took ownership of the DIY discussion. In certain areas, they did so with success. In others, they left room for growth.
“I come from a background of making, and we make everything in the studio, and I feel connected to stuff through making,” Lewin says.
9:55 AM CDT posted by Aaron Colter
# Musician and filmmaker Rob Zombie throws a peace sign after a panel about his upcoming film, The Lords of Salem
9:51 AM CDT posted by Angela Watercutter
Napster co-founders Sean Parker and Shawn Fanning. Photo by Ariel Zambelich/Wired
Shawn Fanning has been toying with the idea of releasing the Dead Sea Scrolls of the digital music revolution.
The guy who wrote the code that became Napster is talking with Alex Winter – the man responsible for the documentary film Downloaded, detailing his exploits with the file-sharing service – in the hotel room of Sean Parker, who co-founded Napster with him more than a decade ago. Fanning claims he’s been “joking” about releasing the code, but Winter is adamant that he follow through.
“Don’t joke!” he said. “We want to do it.”
“It might be really funny actually … it’s just been sitting around,” Fanning notes. But he’s still not sure. In fact, after all the different deals and attempts to save or squelch Napster, he can’t even remember who owns it. He thinks it’s Best Buy. Winter thinks it’s Rhapsody. (Winter is probably right.)
“It’s crazy because the source — it’s basically been sitting in an archive somewhere. It’d be amazing to just release it,” Fanning said. He thinks about it a bit more. “Man, I’d be nervous about people seeing it; it’s such a spaghetti code.”
9:33 AM CDT posted by Aaron Colter
# Photo: Richie Hawtin and Deadmau5
“I don this mouse head, and it’s like, what am I? … I’m excited to take off the head for a while and just use the decks, get out of the cube, and be a tastemaker again.” -Deadmau5
1:16 AM CDT posted by Ariel Zambelich
# Matt and Kim got the crowd all riled-up at the Fader Fort.
Oh, and did I mention it was a crowd of Dell and Intel employees?
WHEN TECH AND MUSIC COMBINE! Well, sort of.
12:54 AM CDT posted by Michael Calore
# Painting by Claudia Billy Baca, a tattoo artist in Austin TX
12:54 AM CDT posted by Michael Calore
# > “When you tell your friends you’ve quit your job to go make comics, people say, ‘Aw, that’s cute!’ But you add ‘…on the internet,’ and it immediately becomes sad.”
— Matthew “The Oatmeal” Inman, keynote speaker.
12:53 AM CDT posted by Michael Calore
# Micah Schnabel of Two Cow Garage. The Hole in the Wall, Austin TX
12:34 AM CDT posted by Peter Rubin
# “Hey,” I said to Wired.com editor Laura Hudson as we walked down South Congress Street. “That’s Fred Armisen.” The joke, of course, was that every male in Austin this week looks like either Fred Armisen or Fred Armisen with a beard. And this guy was like 40 feet away, at night, half-shrouded by shadow.
And then he got closer.
And it was Fred Armisen.
“Hi,” we said as we walked by. “Hi,” he said. (Pretty cheerfully, actually.) And then he vanished into the night. GODSPEED, FRED ARMISEN.
