George Osborne, born to a titled millionaire, has explained that he is cutting the tax-credits that let the working poor survive, despite the Tory party's election promise not to do any such thing -- because it will reduce the deficit and therefore save them from the cuts that the country would have to pay in the future in order to pay down those debts. (more…)
Choi + Shine, an architecture firm, has proposed modifying Iceland's existing power-transmission pylons to turn them into looming giants whose arms are poised to reflect their positions -- pylons ascending a hill will be posed as though they were scaling its slopes. (more…)
Chrome: It’s not hard to watch YouTube videos while you do other stuff online: just resize your windows and watch them side by side. But SidePlayer makes it even easier than that. You can watch a YouTube video straight from the page you’re on.
Once you download the extension, you’ll see a “Play from SidePlayer” option on every YouTube video. When you do that, the video pops out of YouTube and into a small player that follows you from tab to tab. You can close the YouTube tab, and the video will keep playing. You can also copy and paste the video’s URL into the SidePlayer bookmarklet in your browser bar.
You can copy and paste YouTube URLs into the extension, too. It’s an easy way to watch or transcribe something from YouTube from an entirely different window. You don’t lose space in your current tab, and you don’t have to worry about resizing everything.
Give it a try at the link below.
SidePlayer | via Product Hunt
If you are vegan (or allergic to eggs) you’ve probably tried your fair share of egg substitutes. Besides the manufactured options you’ll find in the grocery store, you may be happy to know that there are quite a few in your pantry, and Food 52 tested four of them.
To see which swap reigned supreme, they made four batches of blueberry muffins, each with a different egg-free sub. They tried banana, flax, aquafaba (chickpea water), and adding extra acidic and basic ingredients.
Click the link below for more information on how each substitute performed, but the best egg-free muffin was made possible by chickpea water. We’ve mentioned this substitute before, but it’s nice to know that it’s been tried and tested with good results!
The Best Vegan Egg Replacer for Baking | Food 52
Photo by Jo.
A Disney Research team has developed technology that projects coloring book characters in 3D while you're still working on coloring them. The process was detailed in a new paper called "Live Texturing of Augmented Reality Characters from Colored Drawings," and it was presented at the IEEE International Symposium on Mixed and Augmented Reality on September 29th. That title's a mouthful, but it's descriptive: the live texturing technology allows users to watch as their characters stand and wobble on the page and take on color as they're being colored in. You can see an example in the video above: the elephant's pants are turning blue on the tablet screen just as they're being filled on the page itself.
Augmented reality has been used to...
Sir Simon McDonald, Permanent Secretary at the Foreign Office -- the country's most senior Foreign Office official -- told MPs that his department had sidelined human rights work in favour of global trade agreements (the same agreements that allow sovereign wealth funds from the world's most brutal, oppressive states to buy huge swathes of the UK's public institutions at knock-down prices in the Tories' great sell-off of public assets). (more…)
After years of negotiations, the United States has reached a deal with 11 other Pacific Rim nations on the Trans-Pacific Partnership, The New York Times reports. The deal makes several, sweeping changes to international trade, and now faces what's certain to be a major debate in Congress.
The deal, as the Times reports, creates uniform intellectual property rules and closes thousands of import tariffs, although its full text — some 30 chapters — won't be available for at least a month.
Long before now, the TPP has proven controversial. Groups have accused the deal of being made in secret, and of favoring big business interests. Web freedom activists have expressed particular concern over how the TPP would handle major changes to...
It seems like everyone knows a person with a pirated copy of Photoshop. If you ask them why they don't pay for it, their answer probably amounted to something like this: Photoshop costs well over $1,000, and I use 10 percent of its features.
For so long, Photoshop simply hasn't been for those people — it's been for the professionals who need many of its deeper, more specialized, and more arcane tools. But Adobe has been making the app far more accessible lately: on the desktop, it's started offering Photoshop and Lightroom in a bundle for $9.99 per month, and on mobile, it's started to break Photoshop apart into easily digestible chunks offered for free. Today, that mobile strategy gets even more exciting with the release of Photoshop...
After four months of running under Jack Dorsey interim chief executive, today Twitter finally named him as its permanent leader. The man who helped co-found Twitter in 2006 is now its full-time CEO again. Dorsey is juggling the job with a couple of other roles. In addition to already being the social network’s chairman of the board, he is also the CEO of Square, an e-commerce startup that… Read More
Retailers don’t always ship anywhere in the world. If there’s a product you want to buy that doesn’t normally ship to your country, you can get around this with a service called Parcl.
The online service lets you order items and send them to your address, even if the retailer doesn’t ship to your country. To make this happen, Parcl uses “forwarders.” A forwarder is either an individual or a company that bids for a purchase on your behalf. Then, they buy, receive, and ship the item to you themselves. According to the site, each forwarder is verified.
Once you’ve registered, if you want to request a shipment, you enter your origin and destination country, then describe and link to the product. You can then request a forwarder to buy and ship your item, and they’ll make you an offer for their time and effort. From there, you just have to accept.
Of course, there are traditional forwarding services out there, so it’s not exactly a new concept, but those services are aimed at bulk shippers, and they can be pricey. This is more aimed at individuals, and you can request a single, specific item.
You make payments via PayPal and the forwarder is paid as soon as you accept the order. If you don’t receive your item, the site will step in and help you work things out, according to the FAQ.
Check it out at the link below.
Most often, washing your clothes is as simple looking at them (or smelling them), and making a judgement call. However, it’s not just about that obvious stuff, Brit Lab takes a look at all the gross stuff your body produces that you can’t just use the smell test for.
The obvious stuff here includes washing socks, underwear, and t-shirts. This is all the clothing that’s closest to your body’s primary sweat glands, shedding skin cells, and skin oils. These should be washed regularly, preferably after each use. For towels, which pick up tons of skin flakes and bacteria, its advised to wash them after three uses. Jeans? Unless they getting sweaty or dirty, you don’t really need to wash them at all. The same goes for any other pieces of clothing that are far away from your sweat glands.
Of course, everyone’s laundry rules are a little different, but if you’re just worried about bacteria build-up, it’s best to wash anything that sits close to your genital area, breasts, or armpits regularly.
http://lifehacker.com/5991907/how-ma...
How Often Should I Wash My Clothes? | YouTube via BBC Future
September was a huge month for Android games, with big titles from both well-known developers and indies alike receiving Android Police coverage. Everything from high-end first-person shooters to minimalistic puzzle games are represented below in our monthly picks and honorable mentions. You might have a bit of a wait before your shiny new Nexus phone arrives, but when it does, you'll have no shortage of new games to play on it.
[Game Roundup] Our Top Seven Picks For The Best New Games Of September 2015 was written by the awesome team at Android Police.
There's no nice way to say this: interesting and new apps were a bit thin on the ground in September. Maybe it was the double-threat of new announcements from both Google and Apple that scared off developers, or maybe they're all hung up on ancient Green Day lyrics. Either way, things were looking pretty sparse, but we still managed to find a few interesting tidbits for you. Here are our top seven and a few honorable mentions.
[App Roundup] Our Top Seven Picks For The Best New Apps Of September 2015 was written by the awesome team at Android Police.
IBM division Lexmark (which, a decade ago, lost a key copyright case that tried to ban ink-toner refilling) is headed to court in a patent case called Lexmark v. Impression, where it argues that patent law gives it the right to restrict your use of your property after you buy it. (more…)
With this year's "ag-gag" law, Wyoming has made it a crime to gather evidence of agricultural wrongdoing, from illegal pollution to animal cruelty, even from public land -- and also prohibits regulators from acting on information gathered in violation of the law. (more…)
Google's reorganization underneath Alphabet is nearly complete. Today the company filed an investor note announcing that its restructuring will be official once markets close today. Google's shares will convert to Alphabet shares beginning Monday, though the stock ticker symbols will remain the same.
As previously announced in August, Google co-founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin will oversee Alphabet, with Sundar Pichai leading the core Google business — now separated from the "moonshot" projects and other ambitious initiatives (like Life Sciences) that each have their own place under the Alphabet holding company. The restructuring will give Google more room to experiment outside of search and advertising while simultaneously appeasing...
Apple has acquired a UK-based artificial intelligence company that is developing a more natural, human way for machines and people to communicate.
Chromecast Audio is a very simple product, and that’s probably the best thing about it from a consumer’s standpoint. You plug it in to power and then into an audio output source like an A/V receiver or a powered speaker. The Chromecast Audio supports either standard stereo audio cables or optical via a mini-digital connector. From there, just open the Chromecast app and get the device set up on your Wi-Fi network.
Read MoreChromecast Audio Review: You Can Just Throw Away All Those Crappy Bluetooth Dongles Now was written by the awesome team at Android Police.
Today Google published a patent application for using holograms in a head mounted display like Google Glass. It would effectively let Google create augmented reality experiences that superimpose computer-generated imagery (CGI) atop the real world. Filed in March 2014, the patent shows Google’s research into how it could merge its head mounted display technology with AR. [Correction: This… Read More
If you have a Chromecast or Android TV, you've probably noticed the one big glaring hole in content on those devices: Amazon Instant Video. Now, it seems more unlikely than ever that these devices will be getting AIV support, because Amazon is apparently preventing sellers on the US site from listing them altogether, and will remove all existing listings for the devices on October 29th.
Read MoreAmazon, Gunning For "Biggest Jerk" Award, Will Be Banning Chromecast And Nexus Player Listings From Its US Store was written by the awesome team at Android Police.
Routers are among the most hackable devices out there — rarely updated, easily compromised, and almost never scanned for viruses. But a new router virus might actually be making the devices safer, according to a report from the security firm Symantec. Dubbed Linux.Wifatch, the bug behaves like a regular virus from the outside: infecting the device, operating undetected, and coordinating actions through a peer-to-peer network. But instead of performing DDoS attacks or looking for sensitive data, Wifatch's main role seems to be keeping other viruses out. It stays up to date on virus definitions through its peer-to-peer network, deletes any malware discovered, and cuts off other channels malware would typically use to attack the router. In...
This morning at the Walter Reade theater in NYC, LG (re)announced the dual-display, triple-camera V10 phone, a device we heard all about last night. After today's (short) presentation, we got a few minutes to play with the V10 first-hand.
The phone is made of stainless steel and Duraguard silicone, materials that contribute to what LG says is superior durability, passing drop tests "from 48 inches at various angles." In photos, the textured, segmented back cover looks kind of weird, but in person it feels pretty nice and isn't too visually distracting. The overall device feels weighty and - because of the stainless steel strips along the left and right edges - smooth.
Read MoreHands-On With The LG V10 was written by the awesome team at Android Police.
Handbrake turn! U.K. based taxi app Hailo is handing in its private hire vehicle (PHV) license in London and going black cab only, which is where the business began — only expanding to include PHVs in May 2014 and causing some irate cabbies to attack its offices last year. But from now (5pm U.K. time today) Hailo will only offer the ability to book black cabs in London. Read More
LG has been making Android Wear smartwatches since day one, and it's kept busy. It's put out three smartwatches so far that run the year-old operating system, and as of today, it's announcing a fourth: a second edition of the Watch Urbane. The original Watch Urbane was introduced in November to lukewarm reviews — it's a pretty chunky device without a lot of style — but now the new Watch Urbane is here to address that and push the platform forward even farther.
This time around, LG has given the Watch Urbane an ever-so-slightly larger 1.38-inch display (up from 1.3 inches) with a higher resolution, of 480 x 480 pixels. Even with the bigger screen, the watch's body is actually getting substantially smaller. The excess metal at the top and...
Stagefright is quickly becoming the bug that wouldn't die. First discovered in July, the vulnerability allowed attackers to target Android phones over text or MMS, exploiting a weakness in Android's multimedia preview function. Google, manufacturers and carriers scrambled to patch the bug, only to have another bug pop up two weeks later, requiring another round of patches. Now, three months after the initial disclosure, it's all happening again.
Zimperium security a new way to exploit Stagefright that isn't covered by existing patches, first reported by Motherboard. The new vulnerability works by encoding a malicious program into an audio file, delivered over mp3 or mp4. Once a user previews the file or visits a page where that file is...
In a note posted last night, Jack Conte, CEO of crowdfunding site Patreon, said personal information of users had been accessed during a security breach. The information, according to Conte, included "registered names, email addresses, posts, and some shipping addresses," as well as some billing addresses added before 2014.
No credit card numbers were taken in the breach, and Patreon says that, although accessed, "all passwords, social security numbers, and tax form information" were properly encrypted. Still, the company rightly suggests that now would be a good time for users to change their passwords.
Patreon launched in 2013 as a crowdfunding company focused on an artistic clientele. By the next year, it had 100,000 registered...
The BBC is slowly moving away from Adobe's Flash plugin for iPlayer. The company has rolled out HTML5 playback support for those who'd prefer to test out the arguably more secure platform. While the BBC will provide the choice between the two options, it has noted that Flash will not be removed completely.
Microsoft first released Skype Translator almost a year ago as a standalone app designed for Windows 8. The software giant is now integrating its impressive translation feature directly into the desktop version of Skype, opening it up to Windows 7, Windows 8, and Windows 10 users. Six voice languages will be supported at launch, including English, French, German, Italian, Madarin, and Spanish. Skype will now let you hold a conversation in any of them, without ever needing to learn a language.
"It has been a long-time dream at Skype to break down language barriers and bring everyone across the globe closer together," explains Microsoft's Skype team. "Researchers, engineers, and many others across Microsoft have been working hard to make...