The Gillmor Gang — John Taschek, Frank Radice, John Taschek, Keith Teare, and Steve Gillmor. Recorded live Friday, April 29, 2016. Apple dips and Twitter flutters, but the Gang won’t bet against them as new media picks new winners. Plus, the latest G3 with Halley Suitt Tucker, Elisa Camahort Page, Francine Hardaway, and Tina Chase Gillmor.
@stevegillmor, @kevinmarks, @jtaschek… Read More
The international, unlocked variants of the Samsung Galaxy S7 and the Galaxy S7 Edge can be currently had at great prices from eBay.
Starting off with the standard version of the Samsung Galaxy S7, the international variant of the phone, in its unlocked variety, can be had for just $559.
Seeing that the unlocked Galaxy S7 is priced at around the $700 by carriers and retailers, this is a very good deal for what many consider as the best non-phablet currently available on the market. On the downside, only the gold variant of the phone is available at this price. For … – Source
Words like “gent” instead of “man” and “authentic” for products in place of “genuine” can fetch up to 50% more money on eBay, revealed a research conducted by a British university. – Source
Microsoft has dropped hints that the ‘double tap to wake’ feature – which, gives you an alternative for using the unlock key to wake up your phone – could be added to the Lumia 950/950 XL smartphones.
Replying to a user query on Twitter about bringing the feature to the Windows-10 powered flagship device, Microsoft’s Gabriel Aul said that it’s a common request, and asked the user to upvote it in Feedback Hub.
@RayVanEe Double tap on 950 is a common request, upvote it in Feedback Hub!— Gabriel Aul (@GabeAul) April 29, 2016
While that’s certainly not a confirmation per se that the…
A tweet from HTC’s VP of product management, Mo Versi, reveales some bad news for AT&T subscribers with the HTC One (M8) and HTC One M9. Versi said in his tweet that the Android Marshmallow update for the AT&T branded version of HTC’s 2014 and 2015 flagship models, has been delayed. The HTC executive did add that the manufacturer is still in the lab, and hopes to have approval for the update in the next couple of weeks.
Verizon, T-Mobile and Sprint customers sporting the two handsets have already received the update, which includes a number of new features like Doze. This feature … – Source
As if anti-LGBTQ laws aren’t restrictive enough, some people are now taking bathroom-policing into their own hands.
This was the experience of Jessica Rush, a Texas woman who attempted to use a woman’s restroom at the Baylor Medical Center in Frisco this week, only to be followed into the bathroom by a man.
Rush said the man, who she estimated was 6’4″ compared to her 5’3″, followed her all the way inside the bathroom, and she said it never occurred to her that he wanted to make sure she was a woman until he said so.
SEE ALSO: …
More about Transgender Bathroom, Jessica Rush, Texas, Lgbt, and World – Source
LOS ANGELES — Move over, Chris Pine: There’s a new Jack Ryan in Hollywood.
John Krasinski has been tapped to play the CIA hero for a new Amazon drama series based on the Tom Clancy books.
SEE ALSO: John Krasinski and Jenna Fischer had a Jim/Pam reunion in New York
The series, made with Paramount TV, is co-created by Lost alumni Carlton Cuse and Graham Roland.
Image: amazon studios
This marks Krasinkski’s first TV gig since The Office, where he played the beloved Jim. He most recently starred in Bay’s 13 Hours.
The role has previously been played by Pine, Alec Baldwin, Harrison Ford and Ben Affleck in the movie franchises. The five movies — the first of which debuted in 1990 — have made …
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A digital camera with no LCD screen? Who the heck would buy such a camera in 2016?
That’s the question, Leica surely asked itself when it decided to create the M-D (Typ 262), its newest rangefinder-style digital camera, which doesn’t come with any kind of display on the back.
SEE ALSO: Sony A6300 blows every mirrorless camera away with insane speed and 4K
If you believe Leica’s spiel, a camera without a screen distills “photography in its purest form.” A screen, apparently distracts the photographer during the photographing process.
In other words, the M-D gives you a slower, more old school way of shooting more akin to shooting with a film camera. The photographer is forced to think about composition while looking through the viewfinder, adjust settings with the shutter speed dial on top and the ISO wheel on the back. …
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(credit: flickr user: hjl)
When people think they’re being watched, they’re more inclined to behave themselves. This behavior pops up again and again: in blood donation, energy saving, and charitable giving. There are many explanations for why this happens—maybe we think people are more likely to treat us well if they see us behaving in a prosocial way; in some cases, we might behave ourselves in front of others in order to avoid awkward conversations or having to lie.
Harvard researchers Todd Rogers, John Ternovski, and Erez Yoeli wanted to find out if they could leverage this tendency in order to increase voter turnout. A “get-out-the-vote” (GOTV) letter is a simple, impersonal reminder that has a small but noticeable effect on voter turnout. A meta-analysis of 79 experiments on the effects of GOTV letters found that, on average, they boosted turnout by 0.194 percentage points—for example, from 39 percent to 39.194 percent.
It’s a tiny figure, but if applied across the US, it would result in around 450,000 extra voters (out of an estimated 235,248,000 eligible voters). Not nothing, but still not a lot. Rogers, Ternovski, and Yoeli suspected that adding a hint of oversight to the letters could make a bigger difference.
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Home Chef, one of several startups delivering recipes and ingredients to take some of the hassle out of home cooking, is announcing that it has raised $10 million in Series A funding. Founder and CEO Pat Vihtelic told me that Home Chef stands out from similar-sounding companies in a couple of ways. The big one is flexibility — customers get to choose their meals from 10 overall choices… Read More
As Twitter tries out bigger things to spur growth activity — like changing the order and length of Tweets — it is turning away from others. Twitter has quietly retired Magic Recs, a strikingly effective bot account that used to send you DMs recommending viral accounts or Tweets to follow, run by algorithm that measured how many others you knew were following an account… Read More
We all get cravings for specific foods every now and then, and those cravings can be so strong, they almost feel involuntary, like your body is missing some nutrient it can get from a Cinnabon. This isn’t typically how cravings work, though.
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Anyone who do not realize moms are built to be social media queens are in denial. Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, Twitter — these are tools for sharing pictures and distributing unsolicited advice.
So Mashable asked Pretty Little Liars actress and all-around social media superstar Shay Mitchell to help us teach moms how to be the fiercest smartphone-carrying, oversharing warriors they can be.
SEE ALSO: Who runs Instagram? Girls.
Your mom might not have 11 million Instagram followers yet — or ever. But she probably only cares about your faves, anyway.
You can currently catch Mitchell in Mother’s Day alongside Julia Roberts, Kate Hudson and Jennifer Aniston. Maybe your mom shared the trailer on your Facebook wall. …
More about Pretty Little Liars, Watercooler, Instagram, Snapchat, and Humor – Source
The European Space Agency launched its latest satellite at the start of the week, and it’s already beaming back beautiful images like this one.
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Get ready for some painful news.
Despite what the maker of Nurofen would like you to believe, you can’t cure specific types of pain with its range of pain-relief tablets.
There is no science as yet that lets a tablet know to target period pain over back pain, or that you are suffering from a tension headache instead of a migraine. Shame.
SEE ALSO: The simple cactus may have the answer the clean tech industry needs
The Australian Federal Court was so convinced about this that it fined Reckitt Benckiser, the British company that manufactures Nurofen, A$1.7 million for breaching consumer laws in a penalty hearing on Friday. …
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If you’re the nostalgic type, you might be sad to hear that AT&T will be closing its 2G network by the end of the year. CFO John Stevens says that closing the network will strand a small number of subscribers who are stubborn and don’t want to migrate off of the 2G pipeline. The company is willing to take the small hit on revenue.
While AT&T has already repurposed some of the 2G network, Stevens says that “There still is a lot of cost that is left just to operate even a piece of the 2G network. So we are anxious to capture that savings and use it to continue a strong EBITDA story … – Source
The first step (always the hardest, right?) in solving a problem is recognizing you have one. We’re all familiar with the feeling of grappling with a head-scratcher for longer than we’d like. It can take a while to connect the time we’ve lost staring at the screen with the fact that we’re stuck on something and it’s time to try a new approach.
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LOS ANGELES — One of the great surprises from this year’s Sundance Film Festival was that Southside With You is actually good.
Quite good. Really.
SEE ALSO: Sundance review: ‘Southside With You’ transcends ‘Obamas first-date movie’
Because honestly, if you’re anything like us, you took one look at writer/director Richard Tanne and thought, this is the guy to tell the Barack and Michelle’s first-date story?
“Southside With You” writer/director Richard Tanne at the Sundance Film Festival.
Image: Getty images
But the film is lovely: sweet, artful, funny and rich with layers. Let that be a bro-judgment lesson to us both. …
More about Entertainment, Barack Obama, Michelle Obama, Sundance Film Festival, and Southside With You – Source
Movidius aims to transform prototype robots, augmented-reality helmets and smart cameras with an affordable sub-$100 USB stick that offers machine vision on the go. – Source
Every year, billions of captive-bred juvenile salmon are released into rivers in North America, Asia and Europe to boost wild populations, but their survival is 10-20 times lower than that of wild salmon. – Source
Apple begins rolling out Carekit, its mobile software framework for health apps, today.
Apple announced the open-source software development platform last month with the aim to make it easier for developers to build health apps on iOS devices.
Starting today, Carekit will integrate with four iPhone apps, including two of the Glow family of apps Glow Nurture and Glow Baby; Start, an app for… Read More
The U.S. has started “dropping cyberbombs” on ISIS computer networks, according to a recent New York Times report.
The term “cyberbomb” sounds like something out of a novel, and it’s a new tool in the fight against ISIS. In fact, the Obama administration’s mere mention of using cyberattacks runs counter to years of not officially admitting to offensive cyber tactics. But the term really conveys complex, ongoing electronic-based operations rather than boom-you’re-dead malware attacks.
SEE ALSO: In photos: How ISIS destroyed ancient treasures in Palmyra
What are ‘cyberbombs’?
The term “cyberbomb,” coined by Deputy Secretary of Defense Robert Work, brings up visions of hackers infecting ISIS computers and phones, making screens to go black and causing panic amongst the ranks of the organization. In reality, it’s mostly a buzzword. …
More about Security, Isis, Cyberbombs, and Business – Source
Apple CEO Tim Cook had special words of praise for the Indian market, which he said could become the next China. – Source
When substitute teacher Allison Wint used the word “vagina” in front of a class full of Michigan 8th graders, she expected a reaction of light giggling. She didn’t expect to be fired.
That’s what Wint is claiming happened following a lecture in which she used the word “vagina” several times during an art history lesson. The discussion was focused on controversial art and Georgia O’Keefe’s works, many of which use vaginal imagery.
SEE ALSO: Teacher Fired for Nudity in Old French Erotic Films Regrets Nothing
Wint told …
More about Allison Wint, Michigan Teacher Fired, Georgia O Keeffe Paintings, and Watercooler – Source
In the UK, EE has started taking pre-orders for a new color variant of the Samsung Galaxy S7 and the S7 edge. This is called White Pearl and it’s a hue that will be exclusive to this particular operator in the UK. So if you live over there and want to grab one of Samsung’s newest flagships in white, you’ll have to go with EE as your network of choice.
You can buy the Galaxy S7 for £9.99 when paired with a Pay Monthly plan that costs at least £45.99. For this amount of cash each month you’ll get unlimited minutes and texts as well as 4GB of data. The S7 edge also starts at £9.99 upfront…
We saw the first teaser for Oliver Stone’s upcoming true-to-life spy thriller Snowden almost a year ago
. But the first official trailer gives us a more complete look at what Oliver North has done to the true story of this decade’s most infamous whistleblower.
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Twitter has a bit of a love/hate relationship with mobile platforms and Android in particular. On the one hand, it’s so aggressively possessive and wants an exclusive relationship devoid of any third-parties, on the other it updates its apps at a nice pace and adds new features to them. Oh well, it did let Android users hang behind iOS more than once, but we’re not holding grudges.
After adding a share button to send tweets as Direct Messages, Twitter is working on another feature to make DMs easier to use in its app: Direct Share support on Marshmallow.
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Twitter Supports Direct Share On Marshmallow: Send DMs To Your Last Contacts With One Tap was written by the awesome team at Android Police.
While SpaceX’s own rockets get bigger, two of the company’s founders are betting big on smaller launches. – Source
Google has pushed out a new update to its YouTube mobile apps that throws a new coat of paint on Home as well as brings along a new recommendation system. The update is available for both Android and iPhone.
“Starting today, when you open the YouTube app on your iPhone or Android phone, you’ll experience a redesigned Home, with a clean and simple format that invites you to discover and enjoy,” the Mountain View, California-based company said in a blog post.
As for the new recommendation system, it’s based on deep neural network technology, and aimed at showing more relevant…
Twitter’s latest earnings results have disappointed investors, coming in below expectations as the firm struggles with weak growth in users and advertising. – Source
Wood glue is designed to hold strong and create long-lasting wood joints, but it takes awhile to dry. Hot glue, on the other hand, hardens almost instantly. The combination of the two makes for a perfect method of building sturdy wood joints.
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Twitter reported its Q1 earnings today, and they’re not great. On the back of 310 monthly active users, the company reported revenues of $595 million, with Q1 GAAP diluted earnings per share of ($0.12) and non-GAAP diluted EPS of $0.15. This is a big miss on revenues but a beat on EPS. Analysts’ expectations for non-GAAP EPS averaged out at $0.10, while the average… Read More
Enlarge / The arrow points to the very faint moon near Makemake. (credit: NASA, ESA, and A. Parker)
Today, NASA announced that images it has been sitting on for a year show a moon orbiting a dwarf planet in the Kuiper belt. The moon, formally known as S/2015 (136472) and going informally as MK 2, is in orbit around Makemake, a dwarf planet two-thirds the size of Pluto that spends most of its time more than 40 Astronomical Units away from the Sun (1 AU is the typical Earth-Sun distance).
MK 2 is more than 1,300 times fainter than the planet it orbits, largely because it has a very dark surface compared to Makemake’s icy white color. It also appears to orbit within the plane of the Solar System, which means it’s indistinguishable from Makemake for much of its orbit—Hubble managed to catch it when it was more than 20,000km from the dwarf planet. Estimates are that MK 2 is about 160km across compared to Makemake’s 1,400km.
Early observations show that the orbit takes at least 12 days, and the shape of the orbit is roughly circular. This data suggests that MK 2 formed from debris liberated from Makemake by an impact; passing objects that are captured by planets typically have eccentric orbits. Detailed observations of MK 2’s orbit will allow us to determine the density of Makemake, which will then tell us something about its composition, so NASA will continue observing the new body.
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All mobile phones sold in India from January 2017 will have to include a panic button, authorities have ruled. – Source
Wavestar is a sort of hybridized machine and production facility. It’s equipped with kinetic-energy harvesters called ‘floats’ that resemble the oars used to propel boats. The floats move up and down with the kinetic energy of the waves, and their motion is transferred via hydraulics to rotate power generators – Source
Australia chose a French company to supply a dozen attack submarines for its navy, rejecting a bid from a Japanese consortium that had been seen as the front-runner. – Source
Last month, we told you about proposed legislation in New Jersey that would make it possible for cops to fine someone $50 for texting and walking, or have them tossed in the slammer for 15-days. Other states are following suit. While U.S. lawmakers are trying to pass laws that make a criminal out of those who text while crossing a busy intersection, a city in Germany is taking a different tact by bending over backwards to those who are constantly looking down at their screens.
In the German city of Augsburg, the residents recently mourned the death of a 15-year old girl who was killed by … – Source
Good independent workers are hard to find and even harder to keep if the cost of doing of doing business doesn’t make sense. So Uber is adding a new goody bag of rewards in hopes of retaining its workforce. One of those perks is Fuel Finder, a new feature inside the driver-side app allowing drivers to search for the cheapest and closest gas stations. Drivers simply zoom in a tap on… Read More
Fitbits and the Apple Watch may be the most well-known wearables around, but Xiaomi’s dirt cheap Mi Bands dominated the wearable market last year, coming in second to Fitbit, which was the No. 1 wearable vendor, according to the most recent IDC report.
Thanks to its $15 price, the Mi Band has become immensely popular, especially in Asia. The fitness tracker moved more than 10 million units last year. Xiaomi’s now ready to unveil the next model.
SEE ALSO: Xiaomi Mi 5 is an incredible Chinese phone with an unbeatable price
At a recent Chinese wearable conference, Xiaomi CEO Lei Jun …
More about China, Mi Band 2, Fitness Tracking, Fitness Tracker, and Fitness – Source
“Well did you remember that he’s winning, but the lamestream media isn’t reporting it?”
In this sitcom-y homework parody, College Humor regular Mike Trapp gets walked through the complicated logic of Bernie math in order to understand how despite having fewer delegates than Hillary, “Bernie Sanders is actually winning like the Internet says he is.”
Senator rallies support for Clinton by awkwardly crooning ‘She Works Hard for the Money’
Mom completely loses it when she finds out she’ll be a grandmother
Apple’s new ads show off 4K video, Touch ID and Neil Patrick Harris
…
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When you were a kid, you probably did sit-ups at school for an ab workout. But is the sit-up the best ab exercise? That’s actually a simple question: No way! There are far better ab exercises than a simple sit-up, which can exacerbate back problems and only focuses on one small area of the abdominals.
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Affordable smartphones with specs that don’t just scratch the spec sheet surface – those have been getting quite popular, and Lenovo is keen on being a part of it with the Vibe K5 Plus.
When the Oklahoma City Fire Department isn’t battling blazes, they’re tasked with very rewarding rescue missions.
On Monday morning, Engine 30 was dispatched to a storm drain where a group of baby ducks slipped through its grates and were stuck without an exit.
Fortunately, all of the ducklings were safely rescued and returned to their mother, and they continued on their normal duckling business.
Relive the days of Carlos Danger with hilarious Sundance doc ‘Weiner’
Hundreds of salmon turn calm waters into bubbling sea of fish nightmares
Wolverine returns in the latest trailer for ‘X-Men: Apocalypse’
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I’ve been working in the privacy space for the last six years, and privacy never really mattered that much to me. I can’t say I was ever in the “if-you’re-not-doing-anything-wrong, you’ve-got-nothing-to-hide” camp, but I also wasn’t arms-up-in-the-air outraged that some corporation potentially handed my data over to the police. Then I attended an… Read More
If a recent discovery in the Chrome OS source code is any indication, Google’s notebook operating system is about to officially get access to Android apps.
This weekend, a Reddit user discovered a new and interesting checkbox in the settings menu of Chromebooks running v51 of the OS. Further researched showed that the Chrome OS source code indicates that users will soon be able to access “more than a million” apps from the Google Play Store. To us, this is a clear indication that Google’s Chrome OS will soon get support for Android apps.
At the moment, Chrome OS v51 is only available … – Source
The Lenovo Vibe K5, which was unveiled alongside the Vibe K5 Plus back in February at this year’s Mobile World Congress (MWC), is now available to pre-order in Europe. Specifically, pre-orders are currently live in Greece, with the device carrying a price tag of €199.
This comes over a month after the Chinese company launched the Plus variant of the smartphone in India. Given that the Vibe Plus carries a price tag of INR 8,499 ($126) in the Asian country, the €199 tag for the standard K5 seems a bit on the higher side.
Specs-wise, the Vibe K5 is powered by a Snapdragon 415 chipset,…
The end of on-demand is nigh. The media cover down rounds and startups winding down on a weekly basis, and, as funding stops, it seems as if every “Uber for X” is doomed to fail. However, all on-demand models are not created equally, and their potential for margin disruption should not be viewed through the same lens. Read More
The Instagram Beta app didn’t always show up on searches conducted in the Windows Store. That would happen even though the actual downlink was live. The only way to get the opportunity to install the app was to know the URL address and have the browser on your Windows Phone handset take you to the appropriate page in the Windows Store.
But now, the Instagram Beta page in the Windows Store can be easily discovered, even if you don’t have a clue what the URL is. This opens up the app to anyone using the platform, and should lead to a huge increase in new Instagram users coming from the Windows … – Source
These are some of the best apps and games that came out this week.
Billy
Billy is an easy way to keep track of your online subscriptions. Add the various services you are subscribed to and the app will help you keep track of your expenses. Choose from the hundreds of existing services within the app or add your own. Billy will also notify you when a bill is due.
iOS
Giphy
Giphy, the internet’s largest library of GIFs (geef? jeef??), now has an Android app. All the GIFs you will ever need, and many, many more now in the palm of your hand.
iOS •…
Microsoft’s SmartGlass app is a smartphone-based manager for the Xbox One, and it gets some surprisingly frequent love from the developers for a product intended for a direct Google competitor. The latest beta version is a significant bump, 2.4 to 3.16, thought the changes aren’t immediately obvious beyond a few cosmetic adjustments. The new user interface moves quite a few elements around, and if it isn’t completely “material” then at least Microsoft is trying to make it look like an Android app instead of a tiny Xbox window.
Read More
The Latest Xbox One SmartGlass Beta (3.16) Tweaks The User Interface And Adds A Few More Options was written by the awesome team at Android Police.
“The tunnel entrance to the North American Air Defense (NORAD) Space Command Cheyenne Mountain Complex.” Utah Mining, the company that excavated Cheyenne Mountain, also built a civilian tunnel going from Denver to Idaho Springs. The dimensions of that tunnel entrance are similar to the dimensions of this tunnel entrance. (credit: Department of Defense)
COLORADO SPRINGS, CO—Across the highway from the US Air Force Academy is a tiny cluster of buildings that represents one of Colorado Springs’ earliest claims to fame: mining.
The Western Museum of Mining and Industry (WMMI) looks out onto a glorious expanse of the Rocky Mountains and is home to all manner of antique equipment that extracted minerals from those mountains.
But on a balmy April night, as a spring snowstorm rolled in from the west, Ars attended a lecture at the museum about a nearby mining marvel that was not intended to extract riches, but to bury something more valuable beneath the unyielding rock—knowledge.
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What’s the ideal size for a smartphone? It’s a question so uncertain that for the last couple of years all manufacturers have adopted a two-size strategy.
Samsung did it way back when with the Galaxy Note – a larger, updated Galaxy S. Apple sees things differently, it launches the iPhone and iPhone Plus simultaneously, so the Plus model isn’t an upgrade but instead an option.
Other manufacturers are doing it too, even if they name the phones different things instead of tacking on a Note, Plus, Pro, Max, Ultra, XL or to the name of the larger phone. Case in point, Huawei has the 5.5″…
In last week’s poll we asked you if the HTC 10 is one hot piece of tech or a futile attempt by the company to warm the hearts of fans. Happily for the Taiwanese, 82% or 14,873 of you think the HTC 10 is pretty cool.
That’s probably the highest approval rating we’ve seen and it really bodes well for the future of the 10. However, if people buy it or not is what really matters for the company, which has been struggling to turn a profit for quite some time now.
Nevertheless, it’s not because of the lack of trying. The HTC 10 sports one of the best chipsets on the market as well as a…
World stop: Beyoncé’s new visual album is here.
Lemonade premiered on HBO on Saturday night and Twitter basically exploded. The album was easily the top trending topic of the night.
Here’s what everyone was saying, from those alarming divorce rumor-esque lyrics to the special celebrity cameos.
SEE ALSO: Get in formation: Beyonce’s new album, ‘Lemonade,’ is here
At first, everyone was just excited to have their thirst quenched with some Lemonade.
Even other superstars were ready to receive this blessing.
But then came the lyrics that seemed to be about Jay Z cheating on Queen Bey.
And then, #BeckyWithTheGoodHair.
But don’t worry — Jay made an appearance.
Every single scene was everyone’s aesthetic.
The sheer number of celebrity cameos also had people super, super, super excited. Especially the cameo by tennis legend Serena Williams.
But like all good things, it eventually came to an end.
Then Beyoncé tweeted (WHICH SHE NEVER DOES) that the album was now available on Tidal. Guess everyone has to sign up. …
More about Lemonade, Beyonce, Music, and Entertainment – Source
SEOUL, South Korea — North Korea says it has successfully test-fired a ballistic missile from a submarine and strengthened its nuclear attack capabilities.
Hours before the announcement by North Korea’s state media Sunday, South Korean military officials said the North had fired what appeared to be a ballistic missile from a submarine off its eastern coast.
SEE ALSO: Smuggled North Korea photos give rare look at life outside the capital
While South Korean experts say it’s unlikely that North Korea currently possesses an operational submarine that can fire multiple missiles, they acknowledge that the North is making progress on such technology. …
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Apple says third-party Watch apps for the App Store must be able to run without the help of an iPhone. – Source
Last year was a big year for unicorns. According to Venture Beat, there are now 229 unicorn startups, with $175 billion in funding and $1.3 trillion in valuation. In 2015 alone there were 81 new entrants crowned as the legendary beast. However, the glory did not last. We are starting to see the first signs of a tech slowdown. Read More
Already there has been a huge amount invested in fintech in 2016, with investors funding close to $9 billion in January and February alone. It is a sector of innovation that shows no signs of slowing down. If 2015 was the year of the great “Bank Unbundling,” it was also a year that saw the emergence of a new landscape of financial influencers taking a seat at the table. Read More
The Gillmor Gang — Dan Farber, Frank Radice, Keith Teare, Kevin Marks, and Steve Gillmor. Recorded live Thursday, April 21, 2016. The sudden death of the Artist Forever Known as Prince reverberates across generations, decades, and the melting pot of pop, soul, funk, and rock and roll. As the presidential race settles into a social media-led micro-messaging revolution, we’re in for… Read More
Pinwheel sandwiches are beautiful and easy to make. If you’re avoiding wheat or just want to vary your sandwich wrapper, try using eggs.
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There is no such offer like 20GB 3G data for Rs 50 by the state-owned telecom operator. – Source
a team of researchers has come up with a smartphone application that projects a magnified smartphone screen to Google Glass, which users can navigate using head movements to view a corresponding portion of the magnified screen. – Source
Michelle McNamara, a true crime writer who founded the website True Crime Diary and the wife of writer, comedian and actor Patton Oswalt, has died, the Associated Press reported Friday. She was 46.
Though Oswalt’s publicist confirmed McNamara’s death, no cause was given. She died in her sleep Thursday at the couple’s Los Angeles home in “a complete shock to her family and friends, who loved her dearly,” the AP said, citing Kevin McLaughlin of Main Stage Public Relations.
The couple married in 2005 and have a 7-year-old daughter, Alice.
Oswalt, a popular stand-up comedian, screenwriter, actor and one of Hollywood’s go-to script doctors, is also a prolific Twitter user known to mine his family life for material onstage. Following news of his wife’s death, he retweeted an obit from The Hollywood Reporter. …
More about True Crime, Obituaries, Patton Oswalt, and Entertainment – Source
The great thing about tablet holders is that they hold tablets. There is a tablet holder that you can buy for only three bucks on Amazon right now with coupon code 6GZKNB8B. It normally costs eight dollars, and three is less than eight, so that makes it a rather good price.
The stand is made of solid aluminum, which means it would have been worth a small fortune 200 years ago.
Read More
[Deal Alert] Three Dollars Will Buy You A Rather Nice Looking Aluminum Tablet/Phone Stand At Amazon – Check It Out was written by the awesome team at Android Police.
Tech’s freshman class of diversity and inclusion leaders gathered at Rev. Jesse Jackson’s PUSHTech 2020 conference today to answer the question, “What now?” Within the last six months, Dropbox, Pinterest, Airbnb, Twitter and Intuit have all hired employees charged with correcting their diversity problems. Read More
AT&T is now offering discounted internet service to low-income households in the …
Here’s some good news for fans of the BlackBerry Priv who use AT&T as their carrier. The company has decided to make BlackBerry’s first Android smartphone cheaper than it was before, and not by an insignificant amount.
If you purchase the handset outright, you now need to pay only $639.99, whereas before the price was $739.99. So that’s a nice $100 saved. And the situation is the same overall if you choose to employ the AT&T Next installment plans. Using this method, you pay nothing upfront then followed by 30 monthly payments of $21.34, 24 monthly installments of $26.67, or 20 monthly…
Plastic bag flying through the air, American Beauty-esque. (credit: Getty Images)
Recent reports of an unidentified flying object striking a British Airways flight at London’s Heathrow Airport spurred a wave of fear over drones interfering with commercial aircraft. But now it appears the object may have only been a floating plastic bag, according to British transport minister Robert Goodwill.
The Telegraph reports that Goodwill could not confirm the identity of the object that struck the British Airways Airbus A320 as it prepared to land last Sunday. The incident happened at an altitude of about 1,700 feet over southwest London, well above the regulatory ceiling for drone operations of 400 feet.
“The reported drone strike on Sunday has not been confirmed it was actually a drone.” Goodwill said. “It was the local police force that tweeted that they had a report of a drone striking an aircraft.” That social media message may have been prompted by fear of drones in response to recent British government reports of near-misses with drones by aircraft around London.
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Reliance Jio Infocomm will launch commercial operations in coming months as its test programme has established smooth operations of all aspects of the network, company’s parent RIL said today. – Source
Social networks aiming to change the way we communicate are everywhere. Messaging applications that want to do it all are also spreading like wildfire. With Facebook, WhatsApp, and Snapchat taking a big piece of the cake, it’s hard for a service to differentiate itself, but Airtime manages to do just that.
The app started 4 years ago as a web service, but faced lots of technical difficulties so its founder Sean Parker shut it down and started working in the background on something better.
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Four Years Later, Airtime Relaunches To Bring You And Your Friends Into The Same Virtual Room was written by the awesome team at Android Police.
Baidu, China’s Google and an Uber investor, has continued its policy of spinning off promising business units. Following the spin-off of its student Q&A app Zuoyebang last September, Baidu Video has gone independent this week and raised RMB 1 billion ($155 million) in capital. Read More
Sprint has started rolling out Marshmallow update to Samsung Galaxy Note Edge and Galaxy S5 Sport units on its network. The update brings Android version 6.0 to both devices.
The Note Edge update also includes latest Android security patches as well as some other bug fixes. The updates are being rolled out in phases, with the Note Edge process completing on May 2 and the S5 Sport process wrapping up on May 11.
In case you haven’t received the update notification yet, you can also manually check for the update by heading to the Settings menu on your handset.
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CNN host Wolf Blitzer paid tribute to Prince on the news network Thursday, but he briefly forgot which songs the late pop icon actually wrote.
“All of us, of course, remember “Purple Haze” and what that did for the world of music,” Blitzer said of the classic Jimi Hendrix anthem.
But do you, Wolf? Do you remember?
In Blitzer’s defense, he was likely confusing the song for Prince’s “Purple Rain.”
Dogs give their biting reactions to ‘Game of Thrones’
Giant snake takes a break on kitchen counter after big meal
Bad Lip Reading hilariously takes on Bernie and Hillary
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More about Wolf Blitzer, Jimi Hendrix, Prince, Viral Videos, and Watercooler – Source
After weeks of a very public back and forth with Apple over opening the San Bernardino shooter’s iPhone, the FBI opted for plan B
and asked an Israeli security firm to crack the device. And they paid a premium.
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Quarterly revenue at Google’s parent company Alphabet rises 17% after strong mobile advertising sales, but average ad prices fall. – Source
(credit: Sony)
Today, Google and Sony announced the Android N Developer Preview is coming to a rather surprising device: the Sony Xperia Z3. Owners of the Z3 can install Sony’s “Xperia Companion” app on a Windows or Mac computer and download the developer preview.
Android developer previews are usually relegated to Google’s Nexus line, so seeing a finished image for a Sony phone is definitely a surprise. The Xperia Z3 is Sony’s flagship from 2014. The company’s 2015 flagship, the Xperia Z5, isn’t included in the developer preview.
For the Android M Developer Preview, Sony made it possible to compile your own builds of Android M from the Android source code for 17 of its devices. Things seem to be a bit easier for the Z3 this year—this seems to be a finished image.
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Facebook says it learned that the actions people take on Facebook—liking, clicking, commenting or sharing a post—don’t always tells the whole story of what is most meaningful to them, so just when you were starting to get used to the way Facebook shows your timeline, it’s time for another shake-up. Read More
After backing down in the most recent encryption debate, law enforcement officials still seem to be coming up with novel ideas about how to keep encryption out of our and criminal hands. The latest bright idea proposes that app gatekeepers Google and Apple could apply some censorship to their stores to prevent users from accessing encryption apps.
The suggestion came from Thomas Galati, the chief of intelligence at the New York Police Department, while responding to a question from Congressman Morgan Griffith (R-VA). The topic of discussion was around if it would be possible for the US government to impose restrictions on apps that provide encryption services or end-to-end encryption which are located outside of the country. In other words, how could/should the government force foreign app companies to comply with any future encryption laws in the US.
“Certain apps are not available on all devices. So if the companies that are outside the United States can’t comply with same rules and regulations of the ones that are in the United States, then they shouldn’t be available on the app stores, ”– Thomas Galati, New York Police Department
According to a recent survey, many encryption products don’t originate from the US, making legal administration rather complicated. Galati wasn’t the only law enforcement official to have spotted this trend, with others also suggesting to use app stores as a potential fix.
“Right now Google and Apple act as the gatekeepers for most of those encrypted apps, meaning if the app is not available on the App Store for an iOS device, if the app is not available on Google Play for an Android device, a customer of the United States cannot install it,” – Charles Cohen, Indiana State Police
As you probably expected, those within the technology industry were quick to respond to the suggestions rather negatively. Responses pointed out implications ranging from essentially turning Apple and Google into bodies of censorship, to completely undermining the open model behind the entire Android ecosystem.
See also: WhatsApp next on the government’s hit list in the great encryption debate7
Of course, this suggestion does little to address obvious and easily achievable work arounds, such as side-loading applications, rooting, or jailbreaking. Such a move would clearly have major knock-on effects for popular messaging services, such as WhatsApp, that have recently implemented encryption too. Finally, it’s more than likely that those looking to use encryption for nefarious purposes would simply switch to a different operating system or methods of communication. To me, it doesn’t seem like a very well thought-out solution.
Do you think that law enforcement is onto something with this idea?
LONDON — As the Queen celebrates her 90th birthday; one rather famous baker has been busy.
SEE ALSO: Photos of the Queen (and her corgis) released for her birthday
Great British Bake Off winner Nadiya Hussain was tasked with baking the Queen’s birthday cake, which is, of course, shrouded in mystery.
According to the BBC, Nadiya chose from eight cake designs, but settled on an orange drizzle cake with vanilla butter cream and orange marmalade.
Though the Royal cake is yet to be seen in all its majesty, Nadiya shared a shot of its many tiers in white boxes, which were waiting to be shipped off to Windsor Castle. …
More about Lifestyle, Baking, Food, Birthday, and Royal Family – Source
Builders acknowledged the growing might of social media. Shiv Priya, executive director at Amrapali, said they cannot ignore social media anymore. – Source
If you are a Motorola fan, and are in the market for a good mid-range smartphone, here is some good news for you: the company has given its Moto X Pure Edition smartphone a decent price cut, although for a limited time only.
The device – which was launched in September last year, and is also known as the Moto X Style outside the US – is currently listed on Motorola’s US site for $349.99, down $50 from its usual price of $399.99.
Although third-party retailers like Amazon are also selling the handset for around $350, getting it from Motorola will give you the benefit of customizing…
Curt Schilling was fired by ESPN on Wednesday, following his latest offensive social media post.
ESPN announced the termination of the analyst and former Major League Baseball ace after he posted a Facebook comment about transgender people.
SEE ALSO: 10 times ESPN employees acted like total jerks
“A man is a man no matter what they call themselves,” Schilling wrote, seemingly in reference to a …
More about Media, Espn, Mlb, Sports, and Entertainment – Source
LeEco held a massive event in Beijing, China, to make few new product announcements. They touched upon a lot of different topics, including television sets and a particularly ambitious project involving making an electric car in cooperation with Aston Martin. However, the meat and potatoes of the event were the three new phones being launched, the Le 2, the Le 2 Pro, and the Le Max 2.
The 2 in the name makes it clear that these are successors to LeEco’s current line of smartphones, the Le 1s, and the Le Max. As such, they aren’t dramatically different and represent a spec refresh for…
Google’s Accelerated Mobile Pages is a neat idea system that automatically reformats an HTML web page into a light and speedy version ripe for consumption on mobile phones and potentially strained connections. It’s a sort of mix between the old dedicated mobile sites (which are often broken and lacking in features) and the newer dynamic formatting (which can be too heavy for a phone browser even when written correctly). The AMP system has been going to a few months now, and Google claims that it has “thousands” of publishers on board.
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Google News And Weather Will Get Some Much-Needed Integration With Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP) Soon was written by the awesome team at Android Police.
WASHINGTON — Global warming has mostly made the weather more pleasant for Americans over the last 40 years, which may explain why much of the public doesn’t rank climate change as big a threat as do scientists and the rest of the world, a new study suggests.
But that perceived benefit of global warming — mostly milder winters — will soon be outweighed by more oppressive summer heat, according to a study in the journal Nature that’s dividing the scientific community.
SEE ALSO: March was Earth’s 11th-straight warmest month on record
“Americans are getting the wrong signal from year-round weather about whether they should be concerned about climate change,” said study lead author Patrick Egan, a public policy professor at New York University. “They’re getting the good parts and haven’t had to pay the price of the bad part.” …
More about Global Warming, Science, Climate Change, and World – Source
Happy 4/20 day everybody! To celebrate, Snapchat teamed up with the estate of Bob Marley, and the results were … unfortunate.
Snapchat created a lens that makes your face look more like the legendary musician’s by adding Marley-like features — a cap, dreadlocks, a beard and darker skin. Amusing? Probably for some users, but it comes with some really awful historical… Read More
London, April 20, 2016 (AFP) -A 108-year-old postcard offering a shilling in exchange for its return to an English marine research institute is now officially the world’s oldest message in a bottle after being recovered in Germany. – Source
Sony has been quiet after introducing its new Xperia X handsets in February. However, the company’s equally strong and underachieving mobile department has been busy behind closed doors, working on what appears to be a smartphone with a killer display! If the latest rumors come to fruition, the Xperia X, Xperia X Performance, and Xperia XA will be joined by the Xperia X Premium. Reportedly, its stand-out feature will be a 5.5-inch ‘Whitemagic’ LCD display with 1080p resolution and a face-melting 1300 nits of maximum brightness output. Most high-end handsets today don’t go beyond 800 … – Source
The Weather Channel is one of the most popular rain or shine forecasting services there are, that is why it’s somewhat exciting to find out that it has teamed up with Samsung on exclusive software for some of the top-shelf Galaxy line members, as part of the “Made for Samsung” project that the company announced back at the CES. Your Galaxy S7 edge, S6 edge+, and the Note 5 are all getting a combination of tailored weather app, widgets, edge alerts and unique alarm, courtesy of The Weather Channel.
The so-called Smart Weather Wakeup is perhaps the most intriguing of … – Source
Apple’s head of legal has denied a long-standing rumor that it has collaborated with the Chinese government to provide its source code. Read More
How do you showcase VR experience? We have always told you it’s not something we can really show you. We have tried to tell you what it’s like multiple times… but the only real way to understand virtual reality is to live it first-hand. Your second best bet is to check out Google’s brand new Chrome experiment – Virtual Art Sessions.
New Samsung Gear VR Reaction… Merge VR Demonstration at E3… Samsung Gear VR – Quick Look… Samsung Gear VR First Look
What are these Virtual Art Sessions all about? In short, they are the best way for you to understand VR without actually strapping a headset on. Google used a bevy of sensors, cameras and the actual virtual art created by 6 different types of artists. The main purpose was to showcase Tilt Brush, an art creation tool now available for the HTC Vive.
Also read:
Wireless VR vs tethered VR: which is best for you?15 best VR and Google Cardboard apps and games
We know very few of you actually have an HTC Vive (or have even used one, for that matter). It is honestly the most breath-taking VR headset I have ever used. It is also location aware, giving these artists complete freedom to move around their creations and shape them as they wish.
Participating artists include Christoph Niemann, Katie Rodgers, Andrea Blasich, Seung Yul Oh, Harald Belker and Sheryo & Yok. These come from different paths of life and work in different industries, so you can get an idea of how VR can really help all types of creators.
The Chrome Experiment, which works like a regular website, takes advantage of a bunch of Chrome technology. This includes WebGL, WebM Video, RGBD Toolkit, Three.js and more. For all the technical details you can just refer back to the Visual Art Sessions tech page.
This makes for a seamless and intuitive experience. All you have to do is access the website, hit “Start” and select your artist. The experience will begin shortly, and you will be able to look at these artists in action in any angle you want, as well as any zoom level. You can even speed up the video or look at the content from the artist’s perspective.
Us standing in front of a camera is cool and all, but we must say Google’s experience may give you a better understanding of things. Go check it out!
Visit the Virtual Art Sessions website – Source
In much of the US, people love cheap transit options like Megabus and Bolt Bus that ferry people between major cities. But in the western US, the distance between cities can be hundreds of miles, and sitting in a cramped seat for seven hours is no fun. That’s why the just-launched startup Sleepbus wants to drive you from San Francisco to Los Angeles while you snooze.
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(credit: Intel)
Intel’s Q1 2016 financial earnings report was paired with a major announcement of worldwide firings that will thin its global employment numbers by “up to 12,000” staffers.
The Tuesday announcement clarified that the firings will affect approximately 11 percent of Intel’s global workforce and that the firings were meant to “accelerate [Intel’s] evolution from a PC company to one that powers the cloud and billions of smart, connected computing devices.” A “majority” of affected employees will learn about their status within 60 days, while other staffers will have to wait until 2017.
The news comes as Intel announced reduced revenue projections for the next full year, along with a search for a new chief financial officer. Current CFO Stacy Smith will take on a new executive role “leading sales, manufacturing, and operations” once his current position has been filled, but Intel didn’t clarify the new position’s name, nor whether it was a jump up or down the corporate ladder.
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We are a nation of pill takers.
Roughly half of all Americans have taken at least one prescription drug in the last 30 days (21.8% have taken three or more), and almost three-quarters of all doctor visits result in a prescription, according to the Centers for Disease Control. Managing those pills takes work and, increasingly, technology.
SEE ALSO: Device claims to ‘turn off’ cramps: Hoax or hope?
PillDrill is, potentially, the kind of medication management you’re looking for. The blue and white, $199 product comes with a roll-sized hub that features a largish, monochrome screen and a few buttons, a Mood Cube, two pill strips and a dozen NFC tags (and a free app). All of this combines for what PillDrill CEO Peter Havas calls a medicine management system that “does not require you to change habits.” …
More about Medicine, Healthcare, Pilldrill, and Tech – Source
Earlier this month, WhatsApp has announced that everything you communicate through it can now be end-to-end encrypted, and today one of its biggest competitors has done the same.
Viber is the app in question, and it’s no small deal, this, as it currently has more than 700 million users. With the latest version (that’s already available in both the iTunes App Store for iOS and the Google Play Store for Android), all of your communications are end-to-end encrypted, provided all the people in a conversation have the new Viber iteration.
Like always, end-to-end encryption means no one…
San Francisco-based Mixed Dimensions, which makes software targeting the 3D printing space, has closed a $4 million Series A, with the funding round led by SiliconValley investors Alsop Louie Partners and Dolby Family Ventures. Read More
(credit: Omar Bárcena)
A judge in southern California has ruled that a recent federal agents’ search of a man’s cellphone as he was crossing into the United States was entirely lawful.
The case, known as United States v. Caballero, involves a man who was driving into the US from Mexico and attempted to cross the border at Calexico (Imperial County) on September 28, 2015. While at the checkpoint, a dog alerted agents to the presence of narcotics on the man’s car. The government is now accusing Sergio Caballero with importation of over 33 pounds of methamphetamine, and 2.75 pounds of heroin inside the gas tank.
The government brought the criminal case that same day. However, approximately two months later, Caballero’s public defender attempted to suppress the search of the phone, which revealed a photograph of a large amount of cash. The defense attorney, Nathan Feneis, argued that the search of his client’s phone was illegal under the Supreme Court decision, Riley v. California. That 2014 decision found that law enforcement generally does not have the right to search a phone belonging to someone who is arrested without a warrant.
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The blood-testing company Theranos has been at the receiving end of biting criticism
for months now. But it seems things have finally come to a head: A new report claims that the company is under criminal investigation by federal prosecutors.
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Betaout, a marketing automation platform for e-commerce companies, plans to expand in India, Southeast Asia, and the United States after closing $1.5 million in pre-Series A funding. Read More
If you’re in the United States, and are planning to purchase BlackBerry’s debut Android smartphone (the Priv), here is some good news: for a limited time, the device has received a solid price cut.
Daily Steals currently has the handset listed for $450, down from the $700 price tag that it usually carries there. A quick look at the Canadian company’s official US online store reveals a price tag of $650, so the deal saves you at-least $200.
The model on offer is AT&T branded, although unlocked, meaning you’ll be able to use it with other GSM carriers as well. As we’ve already told…
This is madness. Like, seriously what in the hell is going on. In northern China, multiple bulldozers apparently got so mad at each other that they started one of the craziest demolition derbies I’ve ever seen on a public road. It’s a legitimate royal rumble between heavy machinery. There are normal cars on the street driving around trying to avoid the ridiculousness that is giant bulldozers trying to ram the hell out of each other! Some of the bulldozers even got flipped over!
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A slow, ongoing nuclear waste leak at a storage facility in Washington State has escalated over the weekend. …
A US congressman has learned first-hand just how vulnerable cellphones are to eavesdropping and geographic tracking after hackers were able to record his calls and monitor his movements using nothing more than the public ten-digit phone number associated with the handset he used.
The stalking of US Representative Ted Lieu’s smartphone was carried out with his permission for a piece broadcast Sunday night by 60 Minutes. Karsten Nohl of Germany-based Security Research Labs was able to record any call made to or from the phone and to track its precise location in real-time as the California congressman traveled to various points in the southern part of the state. At one point, 60 minutes played for Lieu a crystal-clear recording Nohl made of one call that discussed data collection practices by the US National Security Agency. While SR Labs had permission to carry out the surveillance, there’s nothing stopping malicious hackers from doing the same thing.
The representative said he had two reactions: “First it’s really creepy,” he said. “And second it makes me angry. They could hear any call. Pretty much anyone has a cell phone. It could be stock trades you want someone to execute. It could be a call with a bank.”
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