Roumen.ganeff

Akasha, a next-generation social media network powered by Ethereum and the InterPlanetary File System, was unveiled on May 3 ‒ World Press Freedom Day. The signups for the alpha release are open. The project is the brainchild of Mihai Alisie, cofounder ofBitcoin Magazine.

The Akasha, a Sanskrit word, is the unseen medium that pervades the universe and, in Eastern religions and spiritual traditions, serves as a substrate for the “Akashic Records” ‒ a permanent repository embedded in the fabric of space-time for all the information that is ever produced in the universe. Alisie’s project doesn’t go that far yet: it just wants to establish a permanent repository embedded in the fabric of the Internet for all the information that is ever produced online.

“Ever since I joined Vitalik [Buterin] in the Ethereum project as cofounder in late 2013, I’ve dreamed about the ways Ethereum could be used to solve some of the biggest issues we face as a civilization,” says Alisie. “However, it wasn’t until early 2015 when I first realized that we are about to create the missing puzzle piece that will enable us to tackle two of the most important challenges we face today as a modern information-based society: freedom of expression and creative perpetuity.”

The problem that the Akasha project wants to solve is the impermanence of information online. Information ‒ web sites, documents, email archives, video, etc. ‒ can be either purposefully deleted by the governments and/or corporations that control today’s Internet, or, more simply but equally tragic, just disappear for lack of maintenance of the central servers where it’s hosted.

In fact, today’s Internet is becoming centralized, with billions of users dependent on a handful of large services. Today’s Internet is also fragile, because it relies on a centralized distribution model, with servers that come and go. If a server goes down for any technical or commercial reason, or is taken down by the authorities, all the web pages stored on that server disappear.

“The next time you stumble upon a 404 page remember that it is a small tragedy in itself. It is almost as if our collective brain has lost a piece of its memory, sometimes forever,” says Alisie. “We are basically living in an information age plagued by arbitrary censorship and digital amnesia, affecting every Internet user.”

The Internet Archive, with its Wayback Machine that stores snapshots of web pages and entire sites, can permit recovering lost information if a suitable snapshot is available, but sometimes it doesn’t have the time to make a backup copy if the original is deleted soon after creation, which can happen in case of rapid government intervention.

It would be good to have a backup system built into the fabric of the Internet, but for that to happen the Internet must evolve toward a decentralized, distributed infrastructure independent of central servers. A limited but conceptually sound model for a decentralized Internet is provided by the BitTorrent network, where files are not stored centrally but locally on the computers of the network’s users. In Alisie’s words:

“What would happen if there was no server to delete information from and instead the content would live forever on a decentralized network serving data through a fractal of nodes? We’re about to find out.”

After a lot of study and prototyping work, the Akasha team has found a suitable technology stack to implement a decentralized, distributed Internet. The cornerstones of the Akasha stack are Ethereum and the InterPlanetary File System, augmented by Electron, React with Redux, and Node.js.

The InterPlanetary File System (IPFS) is a peer-to-peer distributed file system that connects all participating nodes with the same file system and permits building versioned file systems, blockchains, all the way to a permanent distributed Web. IPFS has no single point of failure, and nodes do not need to trust each other. Recently, OpenBazaar, a blockchain-based decentralized marketplace, started integrating the IPFS into its platform.

In an article titled “Locking the Web Open, a Call for a Distributed Web,” Internet Archive founder Brewster Kahle, an early Internet entrepreneur also known for founding other pioneering initiatives such as the Internet Credit Union, Alexa and the early supercomputer company Thinking Machines, challenged funders, visionaries, coders and activists to build the decentralized Internet with technologies similar to those used by the Akasha project.

Since Akasha is built on Ethereum, it will have a built-in infrastructure suitable for micropayments. “In the first phase ETH will be the native token used inside the Akasha ecosystem,” notes the Akasha website. “We chose to focus first on building a working decentralized application and learning from the actual use what sorts of problems we should be solving with a custom token.”

Perhaps Akasha could advance toward implementing the native Internet payment system and other advanced features foreseen in Ted Nelson’s Project Xanadu, a conceptual precursor of today’s World Wide Web, which were never implemented due to lack of enabling technologies. “Humanity needs a better home of Mind,” concludes Alisie referring to John Perry Barlow’s “A Declaration of the Independence of Cyberspace.” 

Editor's note: Mihai Alisie was one of the original founders of Bitcoin Magazine, along with Vitalik Buterin.

The post Akasha Project Unveils Decentralized Social Media Network Based on Ethereum and IPFS appeared first on Bitcoin Magazine.

It's still not perfectly clear whether or not law enforcement can force you to unlock your phone with your fingerprint, but an LA court isn't waiting to find out: for the first time in a federal case, a judge has ordered a person to unlock her smartp...

NVIDIA gave us a taste of its new Pascal architecture with the P100 graphics card last month, which is aimed at servers for heavy duty computing. Now, it's ready to show off how that technology will be adapted for consumers with its new GeForce GTX 1...

If you've been dragging your heels on upgrading to Windows 10, now is the time to take action. Free upgrades to the new OS from previous versions of Windows will end on July 29, Microsoft reiterated today. The company initially said the offer would o...

Full spoilers for Game of Thrones' second episode of Season 6, "Home," continue below.

UPDATE: David J. Peterson, the creator of the High Valyrian language used on Game of Thrones, has posted the full official translation to his Tumblr blog. It reads:

Zyhys oñoso jehikagon Aeksiot epi, se gis hen syndrorro jemagon.

"We ask the Lord to shine his light, and lead a soul out of darkness."

Zyhys perzys stepagon Aeksio Oño jorepi, se morghultas lys qelitsos sikagon.

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EA has announced that Titanfall developer Respawn Entertainment is working on a new 3rd person Star Wars game.

In a post on EA's official site, Patrick Soderlund, executive vice president of EA Studios, confirmed that the game will be "an all-new 3rd person action adventure game set in the Star Wars universe" and that Respawn's project joins Star Wars titles in development at EA studios including Visceral Games, DICE, Capital Games, BioWare, and Motive.

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CBS and Warner Bros. are in discussions about a renewal for Supergirl, and there are rumors it could be moving to The CW.

According to The Wrap, Supergirl costs around $3 million to make per episode, and the ratings of its first season which ended in April aren't making up for it.

CBS head Leslie Moonves and Warner Bros.' TV head Peter Roth are in the midst of discussions, but a deadline is looming, as CBS will be announcing its fall schedule in just two weeks.

The CW network is jointly owned by CBS and Warner, and a possible solution could be moving Supergirl there. The CW already has superhero shows such as Arrow, The Flash, and Legends of Tomorrow, so it would be a good fit.

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Just weeks after coming online from a series of crucial upgrades, CERN's Large Hadron Collider was knocked back offline overnight after a weasel (potentially a Marten) chomped through the wrong power cable. "We had electrical problems, and we are pre...

Google Glass may have been too clunky to succeed in its original version, but the search giant will find its way into your eyeballs one way or another. According to a new patent filing, the company has devised a method to inject a device directly int...

“Web 0.0” a project by Biancoshock in Civitacampomarano, Italy


“Web 0.0” a project by Biancoshock in Civitacampomarano, Italy


“Web 0.0” a project by Biancoshock in Civitacampomarano, Italy


“Web 0.0” a project by Biancoshock in Civitacampomarano, Italy


“Web 0.0” a project by Biancoshock in Civitacampomarano, Italy


“Web 0.0” a project by Biancoshock in Civitacampomarano, Italy

Web 0.0

Was Thor not worthy enough to be included in Captain America: Civil War?

In a funny video Civil War directors Joe and Anthony Russo posted to their Facebook page, Chris Hemsworth reacted to the question everyone has been asking him lately: Are you Team Cap or Team Iron Man? Click the below image to watch the video.

"Who cares? I mean, where was the invite for me and Hulk? Just leave the two strongest, biggest Avengers out of this one, did you?" Hemsworth said while doing (or "doing") pull-ups. "Let us know when you're done messing around, and the big boys will step in."

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Katheryn Winnick has reportedly joined the cast of Sony's upcoming film adaptation of The Dark Tower.

While the studio has yet to comment on Winnick's involvement, sources have told Variety the star of History Channel's hit TV series Vikings will star alongside Idris Elba, Matthew McConaughey and Tom Taylor.

Katheryn Winnick as Lagertha in Vikings

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Fresh from conquering Hollywood, comic book legend Stan Lee, is making his first foray into Bollywood superhero films.

As reported by Variety, Stan Lee is helping to adapt his Indian superhero, Chakra the Invincible for a live-action Bollywood production.

Chakra - a teenage Mumbai tech genius who dons a suit that supercharges the seven centres of spiritual power in his body - has so far appeared in cartoon and comic book form. However, the live action version will see him aged up into his 20s.

The film will be directed by the Cannes-selected Vikramaditya Motwane, and will be co-written by Lee.

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James Coyne will be doing a rewrite of Warner Bros' Sherlock Holmes 3.

This news comes via Deadline. Robert Downey Jr. and Jude Law will be returning as Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson, and Guy Ritchie is back on board to direct.

Coyne worked on adaptation of Treasure Island for Sherlock producer Lionel Wigram last year, which appeared on 2015's Black List for unproduced screenplays. Originally, Iron Man 3 writer Drew Pearce was on script duty for the film back in 2011.

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The German city of Augsburg has taken a novel approach to dealing with pedestrians too buried in their smartphone screens to notice traffic signals. By embedding flashing red LEDs in the sidewalks at busy pedestrian crossings, the city has moved thos...

Hands-on: The TV that's going to rule 2016?

John Romero and Adrian Carmack announced today that they were rocket-jumping back into the FPS scene again with their new PC project BLACKROOM. It's a genre that has been a crowded market for years, but despite the seemed saturation of shooter wanabees, the duo felt the time was right to kickstart it old-school.

"I haven’t seen a game in the past decade that played like the early shooters with fast movement, rocket jumping, gibs flying everywhere, intriguing puzzles and imbued with a dark comedic attitude," Carmack told us when asked why he chose now to unveil the project. "It seems that the classic FPS design is something that people want to play again. Perhaps it’s now a cycle, and it’s time for that kind of gameplay to emerge again."

Romero has been hinting at this type of project for some time, and he feels that he has the makings of a great shooter that fans will want to play. "It feels like it’s the right time because I’ve come up with a game design that can help move the genre forward and allow players to have an FPS experience like nothing they’ve seen before. It’s such a fun idea that I’m really excited to see it in action. I haven’t been this excited about a game in a very long time."

And Romero has given the game a lot of thought. This isn't just some shooter that will be held together with shreds of a story. Romero said he wants a believable story to be the backdrop for a game with exceptional old-school FPS mechanics.

"I’ve thought about the design of BLACKROOM longer than any other game I’ve made," he said. "Designs, or at least the initial ideas for them, tend to result from questions that I ask myself. What if this happened? What’s well beyond the VR of today? What if you wanted to innovate upon that? That is how HOXAR and their holographic mixed reality came into being. PMT (Predictive Memory Technology) was the innovation that took that one step further. Since the initial idea, it’s slowly evolved, piece by piece, into a design that we’re incredibly excited to make." 

And with that he dropped us into the backstory for the game. BLACKROOM takes place inside a company called HOXAR, Inc. in the year 2036. "They are absolutely at the forefront of technology. They have created this environment that allows people to be anywhere at anytime all inside of a giant black room. The military recognized the potential of this technology very early on and got on board with funding that let the company grow. Commercial clients weren’t too far behind. So, now they have military sims and entertainment sims and many more."

Romero said that pretext gives them a huge range of options to play with. Of course, not everything goes according to plan for HOXAR, a problems develop that the player must investigate. "That problem is the unifying conflict that ties all this together. In order to address what’s happening in BLACKROOM, they have to explore where it’s happening at the source across these various HoloSims. Ultimately, all these things come together in the seriously abstract level design that is my forte. Obviously, we have designed the game to play to our strengths."

Romero said the crux of the HOXAR's BLACKROOM problems lies in the Predictive Memory Technology, something HOXAR designed to stay ahead of the VR and HoloSim competition. "PMT was designed to make HoloSims as real as they could be by scanning the participants' memories and using those memories to craft personalized and realistic experiences within individual HoloSims. A soldier who regularly feared a certain type of combat incident would be faced with issues to test it. On the kinder side, PMT could recreate personalities from people’s memories of their loved ones so that they could have a conversation with them in BLACKROOM, a conversation that felt real. It was revolutionary. Unfortunately, it was also not without its flaws. PMT had not only the ability to 'read,' it seems, but also the ability to permanently 'write.' Thus one person’s nightmares became others, and all of these nightmares magnified over time, both inside and outside the simulation." 

Romero is counting on fans of the old-school to back the project. Unfortunately, many successful Kickstarters have failed to deliver any semblence of what was promised, making trust on any crowdfunded project an issue. Romero said he is aware of that, and he and Carmack have a finely focused plan in mind.

"Know exactly what you want to make, work with other very skilled people to do it, and make sure that someone (and in this case multiple someone’s) are watching over every single thing to ensure that the game is on the rails at all times," he said, detailing the BLACKROOM development stretegy. "Of course, there will be something that needs changing, tweaking, etc., but that polish time is factored into the schedule in advance."

And if the project doesn't get funded? Is there a backup plan for angel investors?

"No. For Adrian and me, this is a labor of love. It is a design that we’re incredibly passionate about, and a game we have wanted to make for a a while now," Romero said. “'What if it doesn’t work?' and 'What if they don’t like the idea' hasn’t entered our minds, because we’ve focused very, very closely on what we know people like and what we know people want. The trick is to deliver that while still innovating upon the genre. We’re too excited about the possibility of BLACKROOM to focus on failure."

When it was learned that Romero and Carmack would be teaming up on the project, it was natural to speculate who else from the old id Software days might join them. Unfortunately, Tom Hall, Sandy Petersen, American McGee and the others are busy with their own endeavors.

"We certainly did have a good time working together, and I have a lot of respect for their work," Romero said of his former team members. "In fact, Tom and I have worked together in four different companies after id. However, Adrian and I feel that, since we created those seminal games together, and are in the right place at the right time, that we can definitely do this ... now." 

The game will be developed by Night Work Games, a "dark and violent" subsidiary of Romero Games. "Increasingly, games are being created closer to the film model where you bring a company and a group of people together for a specific purpose," Romero said. "In this case, BLACKROOM is that purpose."

Unfortunately, any time Romero's name is mentioned, some fans with long memories will invariably bring up the an ill-advised ad campaign for a game that shall not be named. Romero is aware of the criticism, and meets it head on, eager to lt fans kow he has learned from it. He vows it will make BLACKROOM a better game.

"It’s been 16 years since that fateful and stupid ad," he said. "Suffice to say that I’ve learned a lot. I have repeatedly apologized, and will continue to do so, for the dumb decisions that led to that ad, for the ad itself and for shipping a less than stellar game. Obviously, that’s not something any designer wants to do. It was a very ambitious project, and while everyone worked hard, there were simply some things we were not able to overcome. Ultimately, while it would be great if every game could enjoy the success of DOOM, DOOM II and Quake, that’s not always going to happen. The lessons from Daikatana are deeply internalized at this point and are reflected in BLACKROOM. Probably the most obvious one is in the level design. In BLACKROOM, I am designing all the levels. In Daikatana, I designed none."

Romero is eager to step up and get going. As a bit of practice, and maybe an early hint of what's to come, he created and released a level for the original DOOM in January that was well received. "I believe e1m8b (Tech Gone Bad) showed that my passion for level design and my ability to innovate is still there," he said.

An AI learning to walk through a Doom-inspired maze by sight is one thing, but how can it handle live multiplayer mayhem? That's what the "Visual Doom AI" competition this September hopes to discover. The first set of matches are limited to a dozen 1...

A lot of tech companies like to throw oddball questions during job interviews, but Shopify CEO Tobi Lütke follows a much easier approach.

He simply asks about the job applicant's life story.

"Our hiring is almost completely built around just going through someone’s life story, and we look for moments when they had to make important decisions, and we go deep on those," Lütke said in an interview with the NY Times' Adam Bryant.

He said the goal is to find out if the person's an optimist who sees opportunity everywhere, without having to explicitly ask the question.

"I find the strongest predictor of people who do well at Shopify is whether they see opportunity as something to compete for, or do they see opportunity as essentially everywhere and unlimited? It’s a rough proxy for pessimism and optimism," he said.

Lütke is a big believer in spotting unlimited opportunities because it's something only companies on a growth trajectory are able to see.

"Being part of something that’s growing fast is better than being part of something that isn’t growing fast because opportunities are essentially everywhere and you’re not competing for something," he said.

Lütke was one of the cofounders of Shopify, an e-commerce software maker that's now worth $2.5 billion. He took over the CEO role when there were only 8 people, and has been able to grow it into a public company with over a thousand employes now.

And Lütke's hiring philosophy seems to be working. Shopify had more than $205 million in revenue last year, nearly 4 times what it had two years ago, and its stock is up more than 20% over the past year.

Read the full interview here>>

SEE ALSO: Why this VC who sold his last company for $3 billion asks this unusual interview question

Join the conversation about this story »

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Robert Downey, Jr. and director Guy Ritchie may be starting work on a third Sherlock Holmes film this year.

While in the United Kingdom as part of his Captain America: Civil War tour, Downey, Jr. expects to meet with Ritchie to discuss the film.

"He'll say, 'I'll meet you on my bike,' all that sort of macho stuff," Downey, Jr. told ShortList. "I've always considered riding a bike in London as taking your life in your own hands. Guy makes it look easy."

Busy schedules have been a problem in the past—and part of the reason 2011's Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows was delayed—but when the team does get down to business, "it is off the hook." Downey, Jr. added, "If we could shoot it on Skype, we could have the whole

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Everyone's favorite paranoid hacker dreamboat returns to type furiously and maybe destroy capitalism in season two of Mr. Robot, premiering on USA July 13. The show follows Elliot Alderson (Rami Malek), a genius hacker who gets roped into an undergro...

If you've wanted to use a virtual private network to improve your web privacy or (let's be honest) dodge content restrictions, you've usually had to either install a third-party client or use a relatively niche browser with the feature built-in. As o...

Like so many stories steeped in organised crime, that of Lincoln Clay is complicated. Once an orphan, and now a veteran of the Vietnam War, Lincoln returns to his life in New Bordeaux (a fictional interpretation of New Orleans) and soon falls in with his old gang.

When that gang is betrayed by the Italian mafia, Lincoln is bloodied and left for dead. But the hardened soldier survives, and begins his plot to take down the man responsible and wrestle the city under his control. This violent and layered tapestry serves as the backdrop to Mafia III, which launches this October on PS4.

Lincoln’s story of revenge sizzles with flavour. As I sat down to play an early build of Mafia III in San Francisco last week, I was greeted by beautiful cars, pulpy dialogue, and the twang of Creedence Clearwater Revival. 1968 New Bordeaux makes a perfect stage for Lincoln and his criminal lieutenants as they dismantle the mafia’s operations across the city.

In this demo, Lincoln fights to seize control of the downtown district from the unnervingly calm Tony Derazio — a high-ranking number-cruncher with a strong distaste for failure. In order to lure Derazio out of his heavily guarded penthouse, Lincoln must disrupt Derazio’s activities downtown. There is an ample number of ways to achieve this, from destroying his shipping trucks to the more personal approach of eliminating his enforcers.

 
These objectives highlight one of the key pillars of Mafia III: no failure but death. As long as Lincoln survives, players can approach missions in a variety of ways, from systematic stealth operations to guns-blazing bravado. If a key mission vehicle gets trashed in the process, no problem — players simply find another way to advance, as long as they keep Lincoln alive.

And staying alive is both a challenge and thrill in Mafia III. Combat undulates between heart-pounding stealth takedowns and the rush of cover-based gunplay. When things heat up, enemy encounters can spiral into large-scale shootouts quickly, which may necessitate Lincoln to call in backup from one his lieutenants. This can include cutting the phone lines to block enemy reinforcements, or hiring some muscle to cover Lincoln’s back.

My personal favourite? Wiring the mobile store and watching a van pull up curbside to dispense fresh armaments, body armour, restorative items, and a confidence boost for Lincoln’s next mission.

 
The final showdown in Derazio’s penthouse is nothing short of spectacular, with copious amounts of bullets exchanged, engaging room design for cover opportunities, and one last surprise when Lincoln meets his target. After Derazio is dispatched, players are free to assign that hideout and its assets to one of Lincoln’s lieutenants. This opens up the larger strategy element of Mafia III.

Keeping Lincoln’s confidants happy is a game in and of itself. Assigning resources to one of the three local crime organisations influences the story, dialogue, player income, and even the upgrades Lincoln has access to. Keeping Lincoln alive is one thing, but balancing the power of an entire criminal underworld? Be prepared for several terribly uncomfortable (and dangerous) conversations.

Mafia III promises tremendous player choice set to a blissfully curated soundtrack. Players can experience Lincoln’s story for themselves when this massive open world hits PS4 this October.

The post Hands-on with Mafia III, out on PS4 this October appeared first on PlayStation.Blog.Europe.