When your grandmother picked up a jump rope and went out to go play in the yard last century, you have to think she probably didn’t expect that one day, her favorite toy would be part of a technology-driven workout regimen governed by linked devices all over the world. Of course, few saw the internet coming — and just as few would have thought that a few feet of rope might be electronically talking to a connected world....

YouTube today officially announced ‘Shorts,’ a short-format video feature that lives right within the main app. While the company has recently been highlighting videos that only last a few seconds long in its mobile app, Shorts takes things to the next level by offering video creation tools akin to those found on TikTok and Reels. The feature begins its roll-out as a beta available only in India. Each Short is 15 seconds long or less....

If you want to be a pitcher worthy of the majors, anybody can toss you a baseball and a book about how to pitch and tell you to have at it. But if you actually want to be good, you need experts ready to analyze your delivery, break down your mechanics and diagnose strengths and weaknesses to find the right combination for your personal success. The right teacher is key to learning and mastering any new skill....

The best thing about it that Zen means business. First off, it only stores your data locally — nothing ever gets uploaded to a remote server. There’s also hardly any clutter or fancy features to distract you from the task at hand, while still sporting an aesthetically pleasing design. The features that it does have, though, make perfect sense — like the teardrop button to change the color scheme so it better suits your eyes....

Remember when Zoom was just a boring app people used to make boring conference calls? Now that it has essentially become a mainstream utility in the wake of the pandemic, the service has consistently been adding features to make it just a little hipper. Case in point: the app now has virtual facepaint. The digital equivalent of a 10-year-old armed with a fresh set of markers, the new feature called ‘Studio Effects‘ allows you to paint over your facial hair, eyebrows, and lips with a few clicks....

The Directorate-General for Competition, Consumer Affairs and Repression of Fraud (DGCCRF) began to probe Google’s classifications after hoteliers complained about their ratings. The investigation revealed that Google had replaced the rankings used by France’s tourism agency (Atout France) with the company’s own grading system. The DGCCRF found that the algorithmic classification had been applied to more than 7,500 establishments found in Google search results. [Read: How Polestar is using blockchain to increase transparency] The regulator said Google’s use of a five-star rating scale was “highly confusing” for customers, as Atout France uses the same type of model....

In a Scientific American article published today, Levin explains how two separate craft landed on the surface of the red planet and conducted a series of tests to determine if there were was life. One particular test, based on the same experiment Louis Pasteur conducted to prove the existence of microbes, came back positive. The results were confirmed in a replica test by another craft 4,000 miles away. Levin’s spent the 43 years since studying the results....

— Nick VinZant (@NickVinZant) August 7, 2019 Green Shirt Guy, whose real name is Alex Kack, is a comedian and activist who attended a Tucson, Arizona city council meeting on Tuesday. There he encountered a pair of anti-immigrant Conservatives protesting the city’s plans to vote on a sanctuary city initiative. When the duo began shouting and waving signs at the end of the meeting, Kack reacted in the most human way possible: he laughed his ass off....

Despite what movies are letting us believe, spyware technology isn’t only used by hackers. In fact, stalkerware technology today, also known as “spouseware,” takes the form of apps or add-ons to a device that allows someone to remotely monitor another person’s activity. These apps have become a dangerous weapon that strip people of their privacy — especially women in abusive relationships. According to a poll by the antivirus provider, NortonLifeLock, one in 10 Americans admit to using stalkerware or ‘creepware’ to monitor their partners’ text messages, phone calls, direct messages, email, and even photos....

Remember 2016? Pokemon GO was sweeping the world, and many felt that we were on the cusp of an Augmented Reality revolution. Obviously, this hasn’t materialized. Fast forward to today, and we’re yet again having a very similar conversation with regards to Facebook/Meta investing like crazy to create a Metaverse — a fully immersive digital world for us all to live in. This type of investment from this many players tends to create a self-fulfilling prophecy: whether we like it or not, there is a strong chance we’ll soon end up with a working Metaverse, simply because our Tech Overlords will it so....

I vividly remember my first week as a Software Engineer at IBM. I was bright-eyed out of college and slightly egotistical. “I deserve this job,” I thought, “Web development is easy; I’ll get promoted in no time!” And then I made my first huge mistake: I forgot to test my code before merging it to master. In college, I took one entry-level web development course, where they taught you that HTML, CSS, and JavaScript exist and you should use Bootstrap and PHP....

“After six months of a public beta, we are now making Google Earth accessible on Firefox, Edge, and Opera browsers,” Earth software engineer Jessi Beck and lead manager Jordon Mears announced in a blog post. “This was made possible by moving Google Earth for Chrome onto WebAssembly (Wasm), the W3C web standard for bringing native code to the web.” [Read: Maps now lets you combine subway directions with cabs and bikes] In 2017, the Big G unveiled a massive Earth overhaul that added a swathe of new features, including 3D maps, interactive guided tours, and knowledge cards loaded with fun facts about the place you’re looking at....

Part of the continued cycle of missing these goals is due to incorrect assumptions about AI and natural intelligence, according to Melanie Mitchell, Davis Professor of Complexity at the Santa Fe Institute and author of Artificial Intelligence: A Guide For Thinking Humans. In a new paper titled “Why AI is Harder Than We Think,” Mitchell lays out four common fallacies about AI that cause misunderstandings not only among the public and the media, but also among experts....

Will we continue to enjoy the calming power of frequent walks around the neighborhood? Will Takeout Tuesday still be a thing? How about weekly Zoom calls with distant family members? Why not? Many of the perspectives we’ve gained and rituals we’ve embraced during the pandemic could be beneficial in post-pandemic life, and I suspect we’ll find they’re worth holding onto. It’s the same in business. As a startup founder and CEO, I know that COVID-19 has driven home several lessons that will endure in how our company is run well into the future....

Of course, it’s most likely that the advertiser had paid for this spot weeks or even months ago, before all of the safety measures. But hearing it while many bars and restaurants have been forced to close meant it came off as tone-deaf. Not just to its would-be customers, but also to staff and other operators in the hard-hit hospitality industry. This got me thinking about the coronavirus pandemic, and how the resulting lockdowns have created a challenging environment for brand marketers who need to figure out how to position their messaging in these unprecedented times....

Examples of these initiatives include the UK’s Rail Innovation Group — an incubator for rail startups — and Deutsche Bahn’s DB Mindbox. Since 2015, the latter in particular, has organised hackathons and supported more than 150 startups with their proof of concept, 60% of which continue their business cooperation with DB. Startups provide an opportunity to innovate with technology, solving problems that have plagued the transport industry for decades, from repairs to safety, maintenance, and customer experience....

Instead, Bitcoin’s stellar second quarter actually attracted a steady stream of new sellers to the market, reports independent research firm Delphi Digital. “The active portion of [Bitcoin] supply, which we categorize as the coins that have moved within the last three months, is beginning to slightly increase,” said Delphi Digital. “The new sellers are actually mostly individuals who’ve been holding for three-to-six months.” 21.5 percent of circulating Bitcoin hasn’t moved in five years Delphi Digital determines how long Bitcoin has been held by sorting its “Unspent Transaction Output” (UXTO) data....

We may not see the production version for more than a year, but Cadillac just took up the gauntlet in luxury electric crossovers that have been laid down by Tesla, Jaguar, Audi, and Mercedes, introducing the Lyriq. While presented as a concept, the model appeared ready for production, promising a variety of new benchmarks for General Motors’ luxury brand: Lyriq will herald the future design of Cadillac according to Andrew Smith, executive director of global Cadillac design....

1. EV charging tips and good charge point etiquette Public charging infrastructure is quickly cropping up, but that doesn’t mean charge points are as plentiful as petrol stations just yet. Some good practices to keep when charging in public are: Once you’re done charging, move along. You don’t want to be sitting in your car texting or playing Candy Crush on your phone while someone on a dying battery is waiting for a charge!...

As hype surrounding the partnership cooled, GAP stock would fall more than 20% from its $14.44 peak. Now, more than a month later, West’s relationship with GAP has again influenced the company’s stock price; it sank 6% on Monday morning after West threatened to walk away from the deal during an appearance at an event on Sunday night. This put GAP stock down more than 26% for the year-to-date. [Read: At least 7,500 Robinhood traders bought Hertz stock after its latest 100% pump] But while West’s apparent influence over GAP’s share price might concern potential investors, it’s the tens of thousands of Robinhood traders who are at immediate risk of being stuck “holding the bag” — a term for those unfortunate souls that stubbornly hold onto an investment that depreciates massively in value....