As developers for tablets and smartphones we like to keep abreast of the latest mobile technology developments . This is a daily digest of mobile development and related technology news gathered from the BBC, the New York Times, New Scientist and the Globe and Mail to name a few. We scour the web for articles concerning, iPhone, iPad and android development, iOS and android operating systems as well as general articles on advances in mobile technology. We hope you find this useful and that it helps to keep you up to date with the latest technology developments.
This '4D-Printed' Dress Just Became Part Of The Museum Of Modern Art's Collection
The Kinematics dress, created by generative design studio Nervous System, is, in all cliches, not your average piece of fabric. For starters, the Museum of Modern Art recently acquired the fashionable objet d’art, along with the app that goes with it, adding it to the institute’s growing collection of contemporary design products. Secondly, the dress is made from four dimensional printing technologies, meaning it’s a 3D-printed object meant to “change shape or automatically reassemble” according to its environment.
Nervous System (est. 2007), Jessica Rosenkrantz (American, born 1983), Jesse Louis-Rosenberg (American, born 1986). Kinematics Dress. 2013. Laser-sintered nylon. Image courtesy of Steve Marsel. The Museum of Modern Art, New York. Committee on Architecture and Design Funds.
“We refer to Kinematics as a 4D printing system because it generates compressed objects that unfold into their intended shape after printing,” creative director Jessica Rosenkrantz told Dezeen. “The garments that we’ve designed can only expand to their full size after being removed from the printer and they do so automatically, no assembly is required.”
The dress is composed of thousands of interlocking pieces (2,279 unique triangular panels interconnected by 3,316 hinges, to be exact), taking the shape of a single folded nylon garment. The dress is entirely customizable, and is able to conform and move according to a body’s flexibility. “This textile is not uniform,” Nervous System explains, “it varies in rigidity, drape, flex, porosity and pattern through space.”
The coordinating app allows anyone to design a Kinematics work, printed by Shapeways, “from an uploaded 3D body scan, selecting the size and shape of the modules and ‘painting’ them onto the dress or skirt in real-time,” C-Net writes. Not only are the resulting garments verifiable works of art, they are part of a movement that seemingly democratizes the way we produce boundary-pushing fashion.
The Kinematics dress will go on view at MoMA as part of the upcoming “This Is for Everyone: Design Experiments for the Common Good,” debuting on February 14, 2015. The title of the show takes its name from British computer scientist Tim Berners-Lee — you know, the inventor of the World Wide Web — who tweeted the message as part of the Olympic opening ceremonies in London in 2012. While Berners-Lee’s quote emphasizes the possibilities of information sharing across the internet, “This Is for Everyone” questions the sentiment through a series of design products that challenge the universality of that potential.
“We sometimes forget that new technologies are not inherently democratic,” MoMA wrote in a press release for the exhibition. “Is design in the digital age — so often simply assumed to be for the greater good — truly for everyone?”
You can see a preview of the other pieces on view in the exhibition below.
Happy eighth birthday to the iPhone
Tech memories, sometimes, are the shortest memories of all. Do you remember what “smartphones” were like before the iPhone? Unless you were fairly well-off, you may not have any clear recall of those hazy days of 2007, when the Palm Treo and the BlackBerry ruled the world. Maybe your dad has one in a drawer somewhere — go find it, power it up, and take a trip back to the Dark Ages (comparatively speaking). Eight years ago today, Steve Jobs blew up Macworld West in San Francisco with an earth-changing announcement.
Weekend Roundup: Is Europe Imploding?
Europe is facing divisive challenges on all fronts. It is being torn within by hardening attitudes toward the growing presence not only of Muslim immigrants, but also of citizens. On Monday, demonstrators thronged the streets of Dresden in support of “Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamization of the Occident.” On Wednesday in Paris, 12 people were killed, including cartoonists who lampooned the Prophet Muhammad, in the horrific Charlie Hebdo attack.
While the euro tumbles, northern and southern Europe are bitterly at odds over austerity policies and continuing high unemployment. And a newly aggressive Russia is challenging European values on its eastern frontier.
Writing from Berlin, Alexander Görlach analyzes what is behind rising Islamophobia in Europe. From Paris, Le Huffington Post editorial director Anne Sinclair pays homage to the slain journalists. “Infidel” author Ayaan Hirsi Ali warns that we can’t let political Islamists define the territory of insult. And renowned Islamic scholar Akbar Ahmed looks at the long history, and present social conditions, of Muslims in Europe.
Commenting on the Paris massacre, philosopher Ramin Jahanbegloo argues that fanaticism that allows no other truth than its own is the sign of barbarism. Writing from Paris, Dominique Moisi resists the impulse to “sacralize” the Charlie Hebdo satirists. Olivier Roy writes that there is no “Muslim community,” only a “Muslim population” in France.
Writing from Athens, Syriza leader Alexis Tsipras lays out the political program he will pursue if he takes power after Greece’s upcoming elections. Writing from Frankfurt, European Central Bank President Mario Draghi argues that monetary union does not require more integration than already exists in Europe. From Kiev, former Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko examines how the limbo of Putin’s “no peace, no war” strategy is corroding the political situation. Alexander Motyl compares Ukraine’s Donbas region to the American Deep South during segregation. Fabrizio Tassinari suggests Ukraine learn from Latvia’s experience that “real convergence” must happen within society before the division between East and West can be healed.
Recalling the anniversary of Benazir Bhutto’s assassination, Farahnaz Ispahani writes from Karachi that the slain leader was among the few to see the jihadi threat long ago. Amal Clooney and Mark Wassouf, lawyers for Al Jazeera journalist Mohamed Fahmy, who is imprisoned in Cairo, argue he should be released and tried outside Egypt. The first president of the Islamic Republic of Iran after the revolution, Abolhassan Bani-Sadr, analyzes the internal political gridlock that is preventing Iran from agreeing to a deal on its nuclear program. Former CIA analyst Graham Fuller sets out his predictions for the Middle East in 2015.
Writing from Havana, dissident blogger Yoani Sanchez reports a continuing crackdown on freedom of expression despite the recent opening to the U.S. American diplomat Thomas Pickering proposes that now is the time to give Guantanamo back to Cuba.
Back in the saddle with a mandate after he triumphed in a snap election, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe says a key to Japan’s economic recovery is to bring more women into the workforce. Writing from Seoul, South Korean Foreign Minister Yun Byung-se proposes a novel form of multilateral diplomacy — value based partnerships. As the sensational corruption trial of “big tiger” Zhang Yongkang gets underway in Beijing, Minxin Pei asks whether it will be a political show or actually advance the rule of law.
Nobel laureate Michael Spence outlines five reasons why the global economy is on such a slow growth path. In an interview, “Capital in the 21st Century” author Thomas Piketty talks about how the myth of national sovereignty lets globe-spanning corporations off the hook. Nouriel Roubini wonders what robots will do to our jobs. Alexis Crow warns that the OPEC sheikhs may still be standing when shale oil wells start running dry down the road.
In our continuing “Following Francis” series, Vatican correspondent Sébastien Maillard muses that Francis may one day become another “Pope emeritus.” WorldPost Senior Editor Kathleen Miles notes that the first book choice of Mark Zuckerberg’s new book club is “The End of Power,” by WorldPost Contributing Editor Moises Naim.
In this week’s Singularity University series, Peter Diamandis reviews the information technologies that erase borders. Gaia Vince looks at the pluses and minuses of the Anthropocene Age, where humans dominate the planet. Christine Kenneally reflects on the controversies introduced by new developments in genealogy and eugenics.
Finally, in an interview, Susie Orbach argues that “fat is a feminist issue.”
WHO WE ARE
EDITORS: Nathan Gardels, Senior Advisor to the Berggruen Institute on Governance and the long-time editor of NPQ and the Global Viewpoint Network of the Los Angeles Times Syndicate/Tribune Media, is the Editor-in-Chief of The WorldPost. Farah Mohamed is the Managing Editor of The WorldPost. Kathleen Miles is the Senior Editor of the WorldPost. Alex Gardels is the Associate Editor of The WorldPost. Katie Nelson is the National Editor at the Huffington Post, overseeing The WorldPost and HuffPost’s editorial coverage. Eline Gordts is HuffPost’s Senior World Editor. Charlotte Alfred and Nick Robins-Early are Associate World Editors.
CORRESPONDENTS: Sophia Jones in Istanbul; Matt Sheehan in Beijing.
EDITORIAL BOARD: Nicolas Berggruen, Nathan Gardels, Arianna Huffington, Eric Schmidt (Google Inc.), Pierre Omidyar (First Look Media) Juan Luis Cebrian (El Pais/PRISA), Walter Isaacson (Aspen Institute/TIME-CNN), John Elkann (Corriere della Sera, La Stampa), Wadah Khanfar (Al Jazeera), Dileep Padgaonkar (Times of India) and Yoichi Funabashi (Asahi Shimbun).
CONTRIBUTING EDITORS: Moises Naim (former editor of Foreign Policy), Nayan Chanda (Yale/Global; Far Eastern Economic Review) and Katherine Keating (One-On-One). Sergio Munoz Bata and Parag Khanna are Contributing Editors-At-Large.
The Asia Society and its ChinaFile, edited by Orville Schell, is our primary partner on Asia coverage. Eric X. Li and the Chunqiu Institute/Fudan University in Shanghai and Guancha.cn also provide first person voices from China. We also draw on the content of China Digital Times. Seung-yoon Lee is The WorldPost link in South Korea.
Jared Cohen of Google Ideas provides regular commentary from young thinkers, leaders and activists around the globe. Bruce Mau provides regular columns from MassiveChangeNetwork.com on the “whole mind” way of thinking. Patrick Soon-Shiong is Contributing Editor for Health and Medicine.
ADVISORY COUNCIL: Members of the Berggruen Institute’s 21st Century Council and Council for the Future of Europe serve as the Advisory Council — as well as regular contributors — to the site. These include, Jacques Attali, Shaukat Aziz, Gordon Brown, Fernando Henrique Cardoso, Juan Luis Cebrian, Jack Dorsey, Mohamed El-Erian, Francis Fukuyama, Felipe Gonzalez, John Gray, Reid Hoffman, Fred Hu, Mo Ibrahim, Alexei Kudrin, Pascal Lamy, Kishore Mahbubani, Alain Minc, Dambisa Moyo, Laura Tyson, Elon Musk, Pierre Omidyar, Raghuram Rajan, Nouriel Roubini, Nicolas Sarkozy, Eric Schmidt, Gerhard Schroeder, Peter Schwartz, Amartya Sen, Jeff Skoll, Michael Spence, Joe Stiglitz, Larry Summers, Wu Jianmin, George Yeo, Fareed Zakaria, Ernesto Zedillo, Ahmed Zewail, and Zheng Bijian.
From the Europe group, these include: Marek Belka, Tony Blair, Jacques Delors, Niall Ferguson, Anthony Giddens, Otmar Issing, Mario Monti, Robert Mundell, Peter Sutherland and Guy Verhofstadt.
MISSION STATEMENT
The WorldPost is a global media bridge that seeks to connect the world and connect the dots. Gathering together top editors and first person contributors from all corners of the planet, we aspire to be the one publication where the whole world meets.
We not only deliver breaking news from the best sources with original reportage on the ground and user-generated content; we bring the best minds and most authoritative as well as fresh and new voices together to make sense of events from a global perspective looking around, not a national perspective looking out.
Solving squabbles over in-car sounds
Car squabbles over music could finally be over
CES 2015: Are The Wheels Coming Off the VR Hype Bus?
By Noah J. Nelson (@noahjnelson)
The wheels on the bus have gone round and round from CES to GDC to E3 — every tech show acronym you can think of — and back again. But here’s the problem with hype machines: the longer you keep them running, the harder it is to keep them running.
Such is the case with virtual reality, which had another big year as the Coming Attraction at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. Right next to all the smart home technology which electronics manufacturers hope we will lose out minds over.
Let’s be clear: the potential for a virtual reality revolution remains an exciting prospect. There are still millions of people who have yet to experience the state of the art in VR tech. The state of the art itself is constantly evolving, with some major announcements this past week by Oculus VR — the company that got everyone talking about VR after more than a decade of slumber — that address the audio component of VR.
As any filmmaker or video game creator can tell you audio can make or break a experience that we primarily think of as visual.
Yet you can only stay excited about a nascent technology for so long, and signs of VR fatigue have begun to set in amongst the tech press.
This bit from The Verge’s Adi Robertson stands out as a red flag on where the technocrati narrative on VR is likely to head:
That’s the problem with much virtual reality. After years of experimentation, we’ve found something that undeniably works: short visual spectacles like a visit to Iceland or a song from a Paul McCartney concert. And unfortunately, that thing is both difficult to monetize and almost entirely passive.
Robertson says this in the context of a larger piece that puts the spotlight on VR’s problem with a native input system. Traditional video game controllers are fine for gamers who can work their paws around one while blindfolded. That’s the real trick with VR, after all: you can’t see what your real hands are doing when you’ve got the goggles on.
Input is one issue, and the other is the explosion of interest — and money — that’s come out of Hollywood. It’s no accident that the first developer’s conference for Oculus VR was held just steps away from where the Academy Awards are handed out. There are skunkworks teams all over Los Angeles, inside and out of the studio system, who are trying to figure out how to get virtual reality to be part of their ecosystem.
The first stop has been promotional material for feature films and television shows. Guests at South By Southwest were wowed by a trip up Game of Thrones‘ “Wall” which was created by the FX powerhouse Framestore. In some ways that was just baby steps, but since it was a big success — at least in terms of word of mouth — we’ve seen even more in that vein. From a tour of the spaceship in Interstellar to an experience designed for Fox Searchlight’s Oscar hopeful Wild.
As awesome as these can be for a few moments, and they are, Robertson is right to be concerned about the lack of meaty experiences.
VR faces a chicken and the egg problem right now, and the longer it takes for consumer versions of this technology to hit the shelves the more pronounced that conflict becomes. There’s no reason to build anything beyond a proof of concept for either a game or a cinematic VR experience when you can’t make any money of it. (Let’s not even get into the motion sickness issues that the prototype gear has.)
So what we have is lots of short form content that begins to rough out what the issues with making VR experiences are. Conventional wisdom is forged (“You can’t do a hard cut in VR.”) and then is tossed out the window a few months later (“But I just did!”). The actual strengths and weaknesses of the medium won’t really be known for decades. If VR can get out of the crib, that is.
What is clear, at present, is that someone is going to have to bite the bullet and announce some serious, long-form VR content soon or the cultural narrative is going to shift away from “Next Big Thing” straight into “Furby” territory.
For those of us who are excited about the artistic possibilities unlocked by VR, that moment can’t come soon enough.
Public media’s TurnstyleNews.com, covers tech and digital culture from the West Coast.
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A 'Wet Hot American Summer' TV Show Is Coming To Netflix
“Hey, let’s all promise that in 10 years from today, we’ll meet again, and we’ll see what kind of people we’ve blossomed into.” The rumored “Wet Hot American Summer” TV show is reportedly on its way to Netflix, according to Deadline.com Even better, the eight-episode limited series will include most of the original cast.
The reported returning cast includes Elizabeth Banks, Michael Ian Black, Bradley Cooper, Amy Poehler, Judah Friedlander, Paul Rudd, Marisa Ryan, Molly Shannon, Michael Showalter and more. David Wain will again direct.
Rumors that a follow up to the cult classic was coming to Netflix began circulating in May, though few details were known. E! reports rumblings of a sequel had been going around for years, with Wain even saying in a Reddit AMA that the follow up would have the original cast.
Though Netflix would not confirm, Chief Content Officer Ted Sarandos had previously teased the “Wet Hot” return. “We’re really excited about the proposition of getting that show together,” he said during the winter leg of the TCA tour. “Stay tuned.”
Image: Giphy
For more, head to Deadline.com.
Police Reform Organizers Pitch Net Neutrality To FCC
Police reform organizers traveled to Capitol Hill and the Federal Communications Commission on Friday to push for open access to the Internet, which they say is an increasingly vital organizing tool in the wake of the controversial deaths of Trayvon Martin and Michael Brown.
The delegation met with black members of Congress including Rep. John Lewis (D-Ga.) and Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.). They also met with one commissioner and staffers from the FCC, which will decide in February whether to classify broadband Internet as a public utility, a step that could prevent broadband companies from charging for priority access to their customers.
“We were founded clearly in response to the murder of Trayvon Martin, on the key premise of the failure of the media to adequately report on the murder,” said Dante Barry, the director of the group Million Hoodies. “If we don’t have access to open Internet, and we don’t have net neutrality, then it limits the ability for black people to save themselves.”
The organizers met with FCC Commissioner Mignon Clyburn and staffers for Chairman Tom Wheeler and Jessica Rosenworcel, the three Democratic-appointed members of the commission. The delegation included Ferguson, Missouri, organizer Larry Fellows III and representatives of groups like Black Lives Matter, the Center for Media Justice, the Malcolm X Grassroots Movement and Color of Change.
Wheeler suggested on Wednesday that he will likely push the FCC next month to redesignate service providers like Verizon and Comcast as public utilities to ensure open Internet access, a step the companies have long resisted.
The delegation of young organizers highlights the rift between their Internet-oriented organizations, which have grown in prominence in the wake of the deaths of Martin and Brown, and more old-line groups. The NAACP and the National Urban League have sided with the broadband behemoths in the net neutrality fight, arguing that stricter net neutrality rules would prevent them from expanding Internet access in minority communities.
Both the NAACP and the National Urban League have received major funding from broadband companies or their charitable foundations, sparking criticism.
“In all due respect, the legacy civil rights organizations have been strong on a lot of issues, but on this one they’re a little bit behind, and part of it is the corporate interests that are in play,” said Barry.
In pictures: Hi-tech fashion at CES
Futuristic style hits the Las Vegas catwalk
YouTuber JennXPenn's Heartfelt Letter To Her Younger Self Is The Pep Talk Everyone Needs
Jenn McAllister has made some big changes in the past two years — and she’s learned a few lessons in the process.
In a video addressed to her younger self, the YouTube personality traded her typical pranks for some pretty thoughtful advice. Jenn — or better known as Jennxpenn — has come a long way since her days making videos in her backyard, including partnership deals with AwesomenessTV and Fullscreen and even a “life-changing” cross-country move to L.A.
“Every single thing that’s happened to me has since impacted who I am and where I am now,” says the 18-year-old in a voiceover, featuring her walking alone on a beach.
Jenn’s words of wisdom to her 16-year-old self include:
“Stay focused. Remember there are people in life who will try to drag you down with them. Don’t forget where you’re going. Some best friends forever… really aren’t forever. But don’t regret the time you spent with them — they’ve all impacted your life no matter how long they were in it for. Even if they kind of sucked.”
But in spite of heartbreak and loneliness, she also learned perseverance.
“We as people never self-congratulate ourselves,” Jenn continues. “So let me start and tell you you’ll accomplish things you’ve always wanted to… Be proud of the things you do and don’t stop. This is just the beginning.”
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Tech Entrepreneur Tristan Walker Wants To Solve Health And Beauty Issues For Minorities
When it comes to men’s grooming, there’s usually a lot of trial and error involved as guys search for the right routine to complement their individual lifestyles. In fact, tech entrepreneur Tristan Walker — admired in Silicon Valley for his success as head of business development at Foursquare — was so frustrated with the quality of over-the-counter razor blades, which constantly left him with razor bumps, that he stopped shaving altogether for 15 years. That’s all part of what led him, in December 2013, to launch his very own line of shaving products called Bevel.
The products are aimed at “men with coarse and curly hair,” according to the website of Walker & Company, Walker’s start-up health- and beauty-products business, of which Bevel is the flagship brand. The line includes a special brush as well as razors and lotions, all of them aimed at the kind of skin-irritation problems that are especially common among black men.
In the year since its launch, Bevel has attracted investors as diverse as Hollywood mogul Charles King, hip-hop veteran Nas and the venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz.
During a recent interview with The Huffington Post, Walker, a Stanford University Graduate School of Business alum and a native of Queens, New York, opened up on developing Bevel, as well as his long-term plan to expand his company and reach underserved minority customers.
From a technical perspective, how did you go about developing Bevel?
We collaborated with a great manufacturing partner, and we went through six, seven different iterations for the formulations of each of the products. We also got the needed advice of some dermatologists around how we can actually make some proprietary formula for not only our priming oil, but our shaving cream and our restoring balm. And after that sixth, seventh time, it just worked. We felt we kind of had the ideal solution for folks. In addition to that, we worked with a great industrial design firm on the design of our blades and our brush.
How do you plan to change the mindset of the consumer who prefers the services of a barber instead of shaving?
Barbers don’t really go out and try to educate [people on shaving and grooming], which is a bit of why we’re here. I think with our ability, we have our online platform that allows us to reach a lot of people very quickly. In addition to the Bevel site, we also have a portal called Bevel Code, and it’s the first digital magazine that focuses on style and grooming for men of color. And we’ve started that because I would go online and I couldn’t find out what kind of moisturizer to use for my skin. I couldn’t find it in GQ, I couldn’t find it in Esquire, anywhere. So we have content like that. In addition to that, we do these in-depth, one-on-one interviews with style and grooming influencers about their style and grooming habits … So we have a few ways to help educate folks who either might be skeptical or just don’t know what’s the solution. But at the same time, we’re in it for the long haul.
One thing I tell people is that we’re not here to displace the barbershop. You go to the barbershop one day a week — let’s say Saturday. Let us take care of you Sunday through Friday. And I think that is meaningful. We’re about collaborating with them.
In your opinion, what’s the importance of owning and operating a black business within the hair-care industry?
I’m 30 years old, and when I reflect back on my life, I’ve never had a company that I was proud to support. There’s a lot of companies with products that I love, but [that I'm] not necessarily proud to support. And I feel like that wasn’t the case when my mom and grandmother were coming up with SoftSheen and that sort of thing. And it’s like, for our generation we can actually build one of the first companies that inspires that pride in our community. So for me it’s important, for that reason.
Number two, it’s a shame we’re being neglected as consumers, given our cultural influence, our spending power. So we want to inspire that pride — not only in the products we make, but the design of them, the educational experience and the service offering we provide. And what this allows me to do is, when you get our box, you get a handwritten note from me with my name and email address on it, because I want my customers to really understand where that accountability lies. It’s with me.
Last October, Carol’s Daughter went from being an independent black-owned company to being acquired by L’Oréal. Would you ever consider a buyout from another company?
My intention for the company is, I want to build something with as much legacy as a Procter & Gamble or a Johnson & Johnson. That’s the ambition. If someone was to come and say “We’ll pay a trillion dollars for your business,” it would be naïve of me, for the sake of my employees, to not consider that. [laughs] But at the end of the day, we’re very much into this for the long haul, because again, we want to build a lasting company that inspires that pride. All too often, you kind of think about a lot of these companies that existed before us — they get sold to a larger company. And as a result of it, the brand starts to lose sight of its authenticity. And I want to make sure we don’t do that.
In five to 10 years, where do you envision Walker & Company brands and Bevel in the marketplace?
I think five to 10 years out, we’re probably going to have a slew of brands separate from Bevel. And every brand will focus on an acute health and beauty problem that exists for people of color — but also problems that everyone has. If you think about the razor bump problem, it’s a problem that up to 70 percent of black men and women have. But 30 percent of everyone else [has it]. It’s a very big problem.
If you think about things like vitamin D deficiency, if you think about natural hair transitioning, if you think about problems as profound as miscarriages — how do you focus on problems that people of color over-index on, but that everyone has? So we’re going to develop a suite of brands to solve those problems. And we’re going to do that, over and over again with great design, great education, products that work and a service experience that’s second to none.
This interview has been edited and condensed.
9 Funny Someecards To End The Week On A High Note
This was a tough week in the world of comedy and satire. The Charlie Hebdo tragedy left us stunned and saddened.
If anything, we learned that we need to keep making jokes, keep being irreverent and keep laughing. Keep the funny going by taking a look at the snarkiest Someecards of the week. This week, everyone could use a smile.
These #AwkwardDate Tweets Are Even Worse Than Jimmy Fallon's Date With Nicole Kidman
Jimmy Fallon’s date with Nicole Kidman was a complete disaster, but the good news for the “Tonight Show” host is he’s not alone.
In honor of learning he blew his chance to date Kidman, Fallon made this week’s hashtag #AwkwardDate, and the Twitterverse did not disappoint. Some of Fallon’s favorites include:
At the end of a 1st date I asked if she’d like to go out again. She said she was going to take a break from dating for a while #AwkwardDate
— Jeff Hofmann (@jeff_hofmann) January 7, 2015
I once took a girl to Starbucks because I forgot her name #AwkwardDate
— ★Benny★ (@noodlez56) January 7, 2015
One time my date told me he had to keep his phone out because his ex “could be going into labor at any time”. #AwkwardDate
— Amber Conn (@AmberConn1) January 8, 2015
Hmm … maybe trying to feed Kidman corn chips and playing video games wasn’t so bad after all. Check the rest out in the video. If anything, they’ll make your dating life seem a whole lot better … you know … hopefully.
“The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon” airs weeknights at 11:35 p.m. ET on NBC.
'Duo' The Superhero Tinder Will Help You Find The Sidekick Of Your Dreams
It’s so tough to meet sidekicks these days.
Tired of the same old lair scene? Not finding anyone you can share your secret identity with? Have you resorted to pairing up with super villains? Or worse, are you a super villain who’s considered teaming up with superheroes because of the lack of options out there?
Actor and professional nerd Wil Wheaton has created a new service called Duo that finds sidekicks for superheroes. Exactly who is the sidekick and who is the hero, well, that’ll be left up for you to decide.
But, and we can’t stress this enough, Duo is not just for getting super laid!
Launch of iOS 8.1.3 may happen next week
Apple’s upcoming iOS 8.1.3 update should arrive next week, reports suggest. Sources for BGR say that some sort of iOS 8 update, whether beta or public, will go live on Tuesday or Wednesday. Web tracking data at MacRumors, however, shows a sudden spike this week in iOS 8.1.3 devices visiting from Apple’s internal networks.
(Internet of) Things Can Only Get Smarter
The Internet of Things looks poised to explode, judging by the amazing technology seen at the 2015 Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, but what are we to do with all the Things that come out of it?
The CES show was chockablock with some of the most imaginative gadgets on the planet. There was a dog collar that tells you if your pet is too hot or cold; a breathalyzer that checks to see if you have bad breath; a headset that measures your brainwaves; an oven that shows you recipes and lets you watch cooking demos; and a dryer that interacts with your home thermostat — plus a raft of self- or assisted-driving cars.
What these seemingly disparate products have in common is that they are all Things which are connected to the Internet. The Boston Globe’s correspondent at CES calls 2015 “The Year of the Thing.” Samsung Electronics CEO and President BK Yoon said at the show that he envisions an interconnected “Internet of Things,” in which everything from your bed to your refrigerator gathers and analyzes data that can improve your lives.
We know that being connected is good, but how do we know how useful it is? The answer is that we don’t. Yet.
Every time we connect a Thing to the Internet, it begins to generate data. Some data will be useful only to the manufacturers of the products. They can take feedback from items such as your washing machine, to determine when it might need servicing based on how often you have been using it and on what settings.
Some data will be so intensely private that no manufacturer (or third party) will be permitted to use it. Data such as when and how often you are at home, what time you walk your dog, how many people are in the house, etc. will only be accessible by security companies, for example.
Still, the majority of data generated by Things will be discoverable and can be mined for actionable nuggets of gold – nuggets that offer new opportunities or identify possible threats to your business. In order to find these nuggets you should be connected to every relevant source of IoT data possible. Next, you will want to analyze the data to find the patterns that can lead to saving money, making lives better or avoiding a potential business meltdown.
I have heard from many innovators that they don’t know what they are looking for in Big Data until they find it. It is only once they are connected and begin to analyze the data that they can see the patterns emerging. It is then they can figure out how to make their business more money – or make the world a better place.
So, it is time to get connected. As witnessed at the CES, Things can only get smarter. And the Internet of Things can only make your business smarter.
Pop Country Music Mashup Shows Ridiculous Similarities Between Six Different Songs
We all long suspected, and now we know the truth.
If you have ears and are human, you’ve probably thought that a lot of pop country music sounds pretty similar. And you were right. YouTube mashup expert Sir Mashalot (aka Gregory Todd) noticed the striking similarity structurally and even lyrically between these six popular country hits:
“Sure Be Cool If You Did” by Blake Shelton
“Drunk on You” by Luke Bryan
“Chillin’ It” by Cole Swindell
“Close Your Eyes” by Parmalee
“This is How We Roll” by Florida Georgia Line
“Ready, Set, Roll” by Chase Rice
The result is an amazing Frankenstein creation that, whether or not you like this brand of country, is pretty entertaining to listen to.
After Years Behind The Camera, Jay Duplass Steps Into The Light
Jay Duplass is having a moment.
The longtime filmmaker made his major acting debut this summer in “Transparent,” the much-buzzed about Amazon original series depicting a trans woman (Maura, played by Jeffrey Tambor) beginning her late-in-life transition. Duplass plays one of Maura’s three adult children, Josh, an emotionally stunted music producer trying to piece together his own identity. Now, on Sunday, Duplass’ new drama “Togetherness” — made with younger brother and creative partner Mark Duplass — premieres on HBO.
But while his television pursuits may be fresh, Duplass, along with his brother, has been inside the entertainment industry for years. The brothers first garnered a following in the indie film community with hit Sundance features “The Puffy Chair,” and “Baghead,” which put their true-to-life, emotionally grounded aesthetic onto the map. They then transitioned to mainstream success with the studio-releases “Cyrus” and “Jeff, Who Lives At Home.”
As the two rose through the ranks of Hollywood, their traditional labor breakdown often put Mark acting onscreen, while Jay worked behind the camera. That division, coupled with Mark branching out to play roles in projects outside the family — such as in projects like Kathryn Bigelow’s “Zero Dark Thirty,” Melissa McCarthy’s “Tammy” and the FX series “The League” — gave audiences more familiarity with the younger Duplass brother. He quickly gained a reputation as one of the busiest actors in Hollywood, working at a rate he himself characterized as compulsive. Jay, meanwhile, was portrayed as the more careful, balanced sibling, off editing an indie film somewhere in the wings.
“Jay would rather make one movie every two years that we direct together and then garden and run and get centered,” Mark joked to Grantland in 2012. “ And I just feel desperately compelled to work. Down to the core of my being. I have no idea why.”
But now, for the first time, that dynamic has shifted. While the two brothers were editing “Togetherness,” Jay was doing double duty on the set of “Transparent.”
“We switched roles a bit this summer,” Jay told HuffPost Entertainment in a recent interview. “He sort of became the dude on lockdown, and I became the one having an affair with my other show. I kind of came to an appreciation of how challenging his life is by jumping around for different things.”
In advance of Sunday’s “Togetherness” debut, HuffPost Entertainment got on the phone with the writer/actor/director to talk about his perspective on the Duplass brothers’ origin story, his newfound passion for acting at 40 and what to expect on the upcoming HBO show.
Short Film Roots: “This is John,” and “Scrapple”
Mark has said before that there was an early period where you both were editors trying to make the day job work. Then your dad helped you out financially and you were able to really focus on making things. Do your first short films come out of that period?
Yeah. We both went to college at the University of Texas. I arrived there when Richard Linklater’s “Slacker” was in the midnight theater, in the early ’90s. That’s when we first started coming to the awareness that human beings made movies — that they weren’t just like piped in over cable from some mysterious place. We graduated from college and we were just sort of hanging out in Austin, making stuff and editing for other people. Just trying to find, I guess, our voice. For a long time we were hooked on trying to be the Coen brothers and failing at it miserably.
“For a long time we were hooked on trying to be the Coen brothers and failing at it miserably.”
Was the appeal that you were also brothers?
That was probably a small part of it. More, we were weirdly obsessed with their stuff, which is funny now because our stuff couldn’t be more opposite. They’re like the most heady, on the rails, controlled filmmakers; Mark and I, we do write scripts but we’re waiting for lightning to strike on set, for surprises to happen. And we shoot in a documentary style. It’s funny how diametrically opposed we ended up.
Your first film that started getting buzz was “This is John,” a short that went to Sundance. Was that the first time you felt like you were finding that voice?
Yeah, that was really the first movie ever. It was just a weird accident, where I was pushing 30 and on the verge of a nervous breakdown because I hadn’t made anything great yet. Mark was just like: “We’re gonna make a movie today. Come up with an idea.” Basically I came up with a thing that had happened to me the day before. I tried to perfect the personal greeting of my answering machine and had a breakdown. I couldn’t get it right and I was like “Oh fuck, if I can’t do this, I don’t know how I’m going to make it as a filmmaker.” We did it in one take and we edited it down to seven minutes. It truly cost $3. We shot it with our parents’ video camera and it did more for our careers than the previous 10 years of just kind of meandering about.
Did you make your follow-up short “Scrapple” with the intention of going back to Sundance?
Yeah, that was the very specific goal. After we made “This is John,” we wrote a couple of feature screenplays. We got an agent [at Sundance], and he told us to do that. But the agency at the time wasn’t doing anything to move it forward. That’s when we were first starting to realize: Oh yeah, agents don’t really do stuff for you when you’ve just made a $3 short film. So we were like, “Okay let’s make another film and go back to Sundance!”
So we made this time a film that happens in a kitchen and a living room, added one person and made it for $50! So it was very incremental steps. At that point, literally people who worked [at Sundance] were like, “Guys, are you gonna make a feature or not? You’re ready.” It was really cool. I always tell young filmmakers: Don’t go make a feature. Make a short. When you’re ready to make a feature, people will tell you. Your friends will tell you, your fans will tell you, festivals will tell you. Listen to your audience.
First Feature: “The Puffy Chair”
A lot of people see “The Puffy Chair” as a spin on the classic road trip genre. Was that a conscious decision on your part?
No, it was really just, we were terrified to make a feature, because we had made some movies in our early 20s that were terrible, and we don’t show them to anyone. We had come to this place where we were like, “Okay, we know how to make short films. The whole world has told us that we’re good at that.” Because we were winning awards at festivals for a $3 movie. So we were like, a road trip is a great way to integrate spine to build a relationship movie. And just more immediately, a road trip film is like a spine to hang, like, 13 great short films on. We felt very confident doing that.
Do you still approach feature writing like creating a spine for shorts?
No, now I would say we’re actively going in a different direction in terms of plotting. Because I think we realized at the time we released “Puffy Chair” that the minor plotting things that we were doing — like tracking certain elements that we would set up and then revisit and pay off later — were extremely powerful. I think it’s what sort of differentiated us. Everyone was saying we were mumblecore filmmakers at the time, which doesn’t really mean anything. Mark and I have always just been trying to make something that didn’t suck. We’ve never been trying to be part of a movement. But I think “Puffy Chair,” the meager plot that it had was still three times more plot than all the other movies that were coming out at the time. We know for a fact that’s why Hollywood came calling immediately.
Development Inertia: “Baghead,” “Do-deca-Pentathlon,” “Cyrus,” and “Jeff Who Lives At Home”
So Hollywood came right after “Puffy Chair” did Sundance?
Yeah, definitely. That’s when we started doing our general meetings. Everyone wanted to meet with us. They were like, “Oh my god, these little dudes made this movie for $15,000. What if we gave them $15 million? The movie would be a thousand times better!” Which wasn’t true. But like, we didn’t do anything to dispel that. We were like, “Sure, we’d love to have some money to make a movie.” We’d been struggling for so long.
From those meetings come your bigger Studio features, “Cyrus,” (2010) and “Jeff, Who Lives At Home.” (2011) Where does “Baghead,” which came out in 2008, fit into the timeline?
We started sort of dating Hollywood right after we made “Puffy Chair,” and we started developing “Cyrus” pretty soon. But that development process was long-winded. It was new to us, it was challenging. It just seemed to go on forever. So we decided to continue to make movies. We were lucky because we knew how to make movies for a few thousand dollars. So we just went back to Austin and made “Baghead.”
“I’ve been holding up universes for a long time, and it’s fucking exhausting”.
Did you find there were things you had to sacrifice during the long development process for your bigger budget features?
No, we never sacrificed anything. We just had to work extra hard to explain everything, and to fight for things. And we did. It’s not like development was all ba