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As we've long noted, usage caps on modern fixed-line networks where congestion isn't an issue are usually just a symptom of a lack of competition, and you don't get much less competitive than Alaska. That's why regional Alaskan cable operator GCI has started tinkering with a lineup of new capped plans that mirror a lot of wireless offers we've seen on the market.

Marketed as "no worry" plans with "no surprises," the new tier lineup offers up some aggressively low caps that, if crossed, result in three options for the user. They can buy a new bucket of data for a fee, can switch to a more expensive plan, or can have their connections throttled back to 1 Mbps for the remainder of your billing cycle.

"Consumers will be able to surf the net, check emails, shop online, etc. Consumption of real time entertainment may necessitate the customer adding a bucket or going to the next higher plan," the company explains in a conversation with Multichannel News. Paying a company $60 a more for a connection that offers 1 Mbps for much of the month could be deemed somewhat "surprising" in 2015. The tiers are as follows:

•R:10 (10 Mbps down/1 Mbps up for $59.99): 40 GB monthly cap, every 5 GB of additional data is $10.

•R:50 (50 Mbps/2 Mbps for $84.99): 150 GB monthly cap, 10 GB for $10 overages.

•R:100 (100 Mbps/5 Mbps for $134.99): 300 GB monthly cap, 20 GB for $10 overages.

•re:D (250 Mbps/10 Mbps for $174.99): 600 GB monthly cap, 30 GB for $10 overages.

You can check out the company's "no worries plan" FAQ for more information.
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Showcasing the sexiest, most photogenic game screenshots this side of the Internet

Andy Kelly's Other Places is an homage to the beauty of video games. In fact, the PC Gamer writer calls the project: "A series celebrating beautiful video game worlds." We're inclined to agree and we've decided to showcase some of his greatest works in this month's Graphics Porn. They're not exactly screenshots, but Andy's videos capture these places in a way that photographs cannot. The videos range from compilations to well-edited footage of specific locations like Far Cry 4's Kyrat. 

Whether you've been using Steam's nifty screenshots feature or simply print screening some beautiful wallpaper-worthy game moments, we want to be able to share your captured works of art with the world. If you think you can do as well as (or better than) the pictures submitted below, please email your screenshots to  mpcgraphicsporn@gmail.com so we can show them off. Make sure to include the name of the game, a title for the screenshot, and a description of what's happening on-screen.

Add Nickelodeon to the growing number of broadcast properties looking to launch a standalone streaming video option in 2015. As we've noted, one of the broadcaster markets hit particularly hard by Netflix is children's programming, since parents (and kids) find it immeasurably more convenient not to have to watch TV on a schedule, and kids are less likely to need to see the "latest and greatest." Nickelodeon has been particularly hard hit by Netflix over the last year.

Nickelodeon's solution is to offer a standalone streaming service of their own launching sometime in February:

quote:

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More details about the service will be revealed when Nickelodeon hosts its upfront meeting with advertisers next month. U.S. TV networks try to sell the bulk of their ad inventory in the upfront market, and TV networks that cater to children typically lead the salvo.

The new Nickelodeon service will be aimed specifically at consumers who use mobile devices, Viacom chief executive Philippe Dauman said during a call held to discuss Viacom s financial performance. He suggested the service would have a different name or brand, and said it will be very attractive to parents and children."

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While it's nice to see more Internet streaming options, consumers are only going to be interested in shelling out so much each month in fees. Consumers are still going to want the best bang for their buck, and will congregate wherever they can get the broadest selection of content. Right now that's Netflix or Amazon, and a streaming service only offering Nickelodeon content isn't likely to change that.
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I bet we can guess what the family Christmas Card is going to look like come December. (Arbroath.)

Filed under: Uncategorized Tagged: Hoomin Interaction, Seals

12-year-old genius Tanishq Abraham shares his favorite science-related jokes with Conan O'Brien.

[teamcoco]

A talking Boston terrier hilariously responds back when a guy greets him with "hello".

[john freefor/via partyfriend]

Now that's a knife! Eetu Summanen, a blacksmith in Finland, made this Damascus steel knife. The handle is made from the jawbone of a roe deer. You can find more of his blacksmithing work here.

-via The Soul Is Bone

Though we still don’t know a specific launch date, name, or monthly cost of HBO’s upcoming standalone streaming service, it looks like some pay-TV providers are cutting their rates for the premium service or offering discounted promotions in advance of its debut.

This is according to TVpredictions.com, which reports that Comcast recently dropped its standard HBO subscription rate from $18.95 to $15, which just happens to be the number that most — including Consumerist readers — are predicting for the HBO streaming service.

What’s more, Comcast is apparently offering a promotion that cuts the monthly rate to $10 for people who order online.

Comcast’s proposed merger partner is also offering that same discounted rate for online orderers of HBO.

That’s the same introductory price that Verizon FiOS is now offering customers for 12 months, doubling its previous promotional offer of six months at $10. Though it still looks like the price will jump to $20/month after that year passes.

TVpredictions notes that Comcast also dropped its standard monthly price on Showtime and Starz from $17 to $12, which may or may not have anything to do with the fact that both of these premium networks have said they plan to get into the standalone streaming business.

Several signs point to cable companies selling access to the HBO streaming service, which would allow them to continue making money off these premium channels.

That might explain why the satellite providers, Dish and DirecTV, have not dropped their HBO rates, as they don’t currently offer an all-in-one TV and broadband service like the terrestrial cable operators. They do stand to lose some business from subscribers who no longer have a reason to pay for live TV, but at the same time many of their customers — especially those in rural areas — may not have broadband access that would be fast enough to handle HD video streaming.

Again, until HBO finally pulls the curtain off its service, much of this is speculation.

[via DSLreports.com]

This is not how Comcast wanted to end a week that saw it having to explain how a supposedly rogue employee could change a customer’s name to “A**hole Brown.” Other customers have since come forward claiming they also had their names tweaked for the worst by Comcast staffers.

Once again the complaints come via journalist and consumer advocate Christopher Elliott’s blog, which first broke the news of the A**hole incident.

As that story caught fire online, other Comcast customers reached out to Elliott with claims that their accounts were altered with offensive names.

One customer’s bill added the word “Whore” to the name on her account.

“What’s most interesting is that Comcast said the ‘whore’ was added on Dec. 6,” she tells Elliott. “I have no record of any recent contact with Comcast until Dec. 16. So whoever chose to re-name me picked my account out of a hat. That says there are probably millions of us out there who Comcast employees have renamed. We need to find all of them.”

The woman, whose name is not “Whore,” said she had to speak with “at least 20″ Comcast staffers over the course of several weeks before her account was finally fixed.

And it’s not just happening to customers with paper bills. One Comcast subscriber says she checked her account online and saw that her first name had been replaced with “dummy.”

“They changed my name to ‘dummy’ in my online account, so that the greeting was ‘Hello, dummy,’” she tells Elliott. “I had to call several times but they said they didn’t see it until I went in person to Comcast and they removed it.”

She claims that no one offered an apology or explanation for how the name change occurred.

A third customer says that after his parents called Comcast to remove their phone and TV services from the account, the first name on the account was mysteriously changed to “Fakoe,” which in no way resembles the name previously on the account.

“This ‘Fakoe’ name is nowhere near either of their monikers and seems to be an insult in the form of the F-word aimed towards my parents,” the customers’ kid explains.

One former subcontractor for Comcast explains how it’s easy to make these name changes, but that it would have to be deliberate.

“There are no confirmations or prompts asking you if you want to do something or not,” he tells Elliott. “But it does take some serious navigation to get to the portion of the biller, or the software they used to make changes on accounts, where you change account names and information. So the rep who changed the customer’s name to ‘a**hole’ couldn’t have done it by accident.”

We’ve contacted Comcast HQ for comment on this latest spate of insulting name-changes and will update when we hear anything back.

It’s been a whirlwind week for the relationship between e-commerce giant Alibaba and the Chinese government. After one agency released a report criticizing the company for allowing fake goods to be sold online through its vendors, and another government group promised to crack down on such practices in general, Alibaba is now pledging to shape up its business practices.

Alibaba and its eBay-like subsidiary Taobao at first seemed a bit ticked off by Wednesday’s white paper from the State Administration of Industry and Commerce, which alleged that “Alibaba Group hasn’t been paying enough attention to the mismanagement of the Alibaba Internet transaction platforms for a long time.”

Taobao said in a statement at the time that the site is “willing to assume the responsibility of fighting fakes,” while also saying it would file a formal complaint with the SAIC regarding the investigation. It alleged that a top SAIC official demonstrated “procedural misconduct during the supervision process” and that SAIC obtained a “biased conclusion using the wrong methodology.”

But as of yesterday, the white paper was removed from SAIC’s site, and today Alibaba has come forward to pledge a renewed effort to prevent fake goods from being sold online. This, after the value of its U.S.-traded shares took a major hit, reports the Associated Press.

Alibaba founder Jack Ma and the director of the SAIC met and pledged to work together more closely to fight sales of fake items, the agency said.

Though e-commerce “still has problems” says SAIC director Zhang Mao in the statement, it’s still important to create jobs and keep the economy robust, so companies need to “strengthen self-discipline.”

“The two sides will strengthen communication to jointly explore management of online markets and build a new pattern of governance,” said the statement, citing Alibaba’s Ma as promising to spend more on culling fake goods from the online racks. “Regulators will further strengthen Internet market supervision.”

Alibaba promises more action against fake goods [Associated Press]

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What you "like" on Facebook may seem inconsequential now — but there's a good chance that will change in the future.

A new study, cited by The New York Times, finds that computer models can draw accurate and detailed conclusions about your personality and creditworthiness, among other things, based on your Facebook "likes."

According to researchers Youyou Wu and Dr. David Stillwell of the University of Cambridge, and Dr. Michal Kosinski of Stanford University, employers may eventually use this technology to make important hiring decisions.

In a paper on the study, the researchers write: "Although accurate personality judgments stem from social-cognitive skills, developments in machine learning show that computer models can also make valid judgments." They found that these models may even make better judgments than humans.

Using a sample of 86,220 volunteers who completed a 100-item personality questionnaire, the researchers determined that computer predictions based on a generic digital footprint (Facebook "likes") are more accurate than those made by the participants' Facebook friends using a personality questionnaire.

The researchers found that someone who "likes" Nike and In-N-Out Burger, for example, is likely a calm and relaxed person.

"Computers outpacing humans in personality judgment presents significant opportunities and challenges in the areas of psychological assessment, marketing, and privacy," they write in the paper.

Another process this may have an affect on? Hiring.

"Currently, occupational psychologists evaluate people's characteristics and decide the fit between people and jobs," Wu tells Business Insider. "It's very likely that in the future this process of assessing personalities and determining how someone's characteristics are related to a certain job will be automated using computer models like ours."

Stillwell says there are many benefits to using computer models like the ones he and his colleagues have created — which are only being used for their research projects for now — as long as they are implemented with a respect of privacy and ethics. "One, computer models are cheaper than human capital; two, computer models are more efficient and can be applied on a large scale; and three, they generate more reliable results, as computers can use big data to detect unobservable patterns between likes and personality, or between personality and jobs."

Eventually, he says, employers will be presented with a list of job candidates that computers deem the best matches, without knowing why they are suitable. "Besides the benefits we already mentioned, this approach would help promote equality in the selection process and avoid human biases prevalent in occupational settings," Stillwell adds. "Computers do not favor people of certain gender, race, or personality."

But of course there is some apprehension. 

"I think people, from a job candidate's perspective, might be at first worried about not being able to present themselves in the way they want anymore," Kosinski says.

But they needn't be worried, he argues, since if candidates present themselves in an inaccurate way on social media, it could eventually lead to a mismatch between their characteristics and the job.

As for whether employers will begin using these models for hiring purposes and when, the researchers are unsure.

"It takes time for companies to switch gears and accept a new recruiting method," says Kosinski. "I think it's likely that some companies will experiment with computer's evaluations, and use it as a reference in addition to other traditional metrics. There are also legal and ethical concerns that need to be addressed before any implementation," he explains. 

"For instance, users need to understand which of their personal data is out there, how it is being used, and how it might be used," he continues. "We also need to enable users to take full control of their data and decide for which purpose it is to be used. Both aspects have relatively well understood technological solutions, but their implementation may require user awareness and, perhaps, some nudges from policy makers."

Wu says any companies that collect data on individuals, like Facebook and major banks, should take it upon themselves to inform the public about how that data can be used to benefit the users themselves. "I believe that if users have a better sense of how their online experiences can be improved by letting their data be analyzed, and they have the control over how and what data are analyzed, they will be more motivated to share their data." 

SEE ALSO: Google's HR Chief Explains Why You Shouldn't Pay Someone To Write Your Résumé

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Those wonderful looping animations we call GIFs are an unlikely story of survival in an age when digital formats come and go like the wind. The lure of the decades-old GIF format has caused people to ignore its flaws, but those looking to bring the format into modern times might just be inadvertently drowning its very soul.

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Don't click any porn links on Facebook. Just don't. It's a good rule of thumb, but there's an extra good reason right now. There's a troubling type of porn-based malware that's apparently infected over 110,000 Facebook users in two days. And you could get the same Click Transmitted Disease.

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At long last, Google Now will support third-party apps. That means that in addition to serving you helpful information like when your next appointment is and how long it'll take you to get to the airport, Google's predictive search app will now push ...

Everybody loves music- it's the sound that soothes our savage souls, the beats we dance to, the ringtones in our phones and the rhythms we hear as we make our way through the world. Everywhere you go people are groovin' to their favorite tunes because hearing a great song puts the world in a groovy mood!

Music and geekdom make a perfect pair, and in the NeatoShop you'll find all kinds of cool designs that combine your favorite geeky subject matter with musical flair, most of which are only available in the rockinest online store- the NeatoShop!

Clockwork Orange Singin' In The Rain by Dutyfreak

Music inspired mashups usually start with great cover art

Galactic Empire-The Trooper by Markwelser

Iconic art that comes to define the band, and their signature sound

Jokers Gotham Tour 1989 by Demonigote

Fans like their favorite art to reflect their taste in music

Old School Rock N Roll Skull by Mudge

To fans the cover art is more than just a design- it's a representation of the listener's state of mind after hearing their favorite album

A Lab Insane II by 6amcrisis

Sometimes listening to a certain kind of music puts the listener in a mellow mood

Hey-Mon by Rocky Davies

Guiding the listener on a musical journey inside their mind

The Silence by Nemons

Other times hearing their favorite tunes tends to drive fans totally crazy

I Used To Be Funny... by Manny Peters Art + Design

Music can stir up a myriad of emotions, and totally change the energy in the room

Live From Zebes by Jehsee

Bringing the sound of the streets to life like never before

Hip Hop Grandma by Manos pd

Or capturing that country sound so perfectly it's scary

Fazbear's Jamboree by Ninjaink

No matter the genre or the tempo listening to music can be a total trip

Music Space by BarmalisiRTB

And it can make you feel like totally rockin' out!

Zim Pilgrim by CoDDesigns

We bat at the air as drummers pound out a catchy beat

The Great Drummers of our Time by Lederman Studio

We clutch invisible mics and sing at the top of our lungs when we're home alone

JAGUARS ROCK by Mudge

The music building a bridge between our heads and our hearts

Appetite For Construction by Cubik

We toss caution to the wind, our fear of the future placed on hold one track length at a time

Benderama Shiny Metal Ass by A_Man_Oxford

Those wicked tunes becoming a part of who we are

Metaleficent by Nemons

We wear our musical attitudes on our sleeves

The Hound Pistols by Olipop

And happily headbang along to the savage rhythm

Dunderhead by Dann Matthews

Music makes us feel like the master of our own tonal universe

Grayskull Maiden by Profeta999

It makes us feel like we're part of an exclusive club

I Wanna Be An Avenger by Markwelser

And teaches us what it means to be human

Vs The Wooorld by Kgullholmen

Music inspires us to explore the world and the cosmos beyond

Sagan / Slayer (Monsters Of Grok) by Amorphia Apparel

And makes us proud to hail from such a rockin' hometown

Born In Pallet Town by Alberto Arni

We feel like all is right in the universe when our favorite singers belt out a badass tune

It Ain't Personal by Rocky Davies

And we want so bad to be a part of our favorite bands that we start to dress just like them

The Deathstrokes by Alecxps

In hopes that a bit of their music star persona will rub off on us

Who's Mad? by Ddjvigo

We music fans are never too old to take in a timeless tune

Rock & Roll by tomburns

And we're gonna keep on rockin' until our dying day!

The Dreams In Which I'm Dying by Rocky Davies

Bring home some rockin' new gear for the new year, head to the NeatoShop and pick up one of these totally radical designs on a t-shirt or hoodie. All sales support Neatorama and indie artists from around the world who designed these great shirts for music lovers like you, so sound off in style and share your love of good music with the world with a NeatoShop shirt!