TapeMonkey

Spoons Perry New Song - Django Djang

2012-07-20T19:00:00.002+10:00

And Spoons Perry is back with more videos and her own Channel... check it out. Django Djang Great Song...

VOTD: Movie Trivia Animations by Evan Seitz

2012-05-02T11:53:00.000+10:00

Movie fans love a good movie trivia game and Evan Seitz has created some fun, albiet it quick, ones. Seitz has animated three beautiful, 30 second videos of different, morphing imagery that are all meant to evoke specific movies. There’s one based on colors, another on numbers and a third letters. How many can you name? Check out the videos below.

Thanks /Film

NAB 2012 - An Australian Post Perspecive: Its NAB time again!

2012-04-16T09:09:00.001+10:00

From a dude at NAB who's watching all the new film and media tech roll in...

NAB 2012 - An Australian Post Perspecive: Its NAB time again!: Here we go again folks! I'm off to Vegas on the 12th for NAB 2012. I'll be covering all our meetings, whats happening on the show floor an...

Progress on the Mass Effect Anime

2012-03-29T09:53:00.000+11:00

If you love the Mass Effect universe and anime, then you might be interested in checking out the upcoming Mass Effect anime, Paragon Lost. The story revolves around James Vega as he and his squad must defend a colony against The Collectors, aliens that have been turned by The Reapers to collect humans. Vega talks about his history for a bit in the Mass Effect 3 game.

James Vega is my least favorite character in Mass Effect 3. I would prefer for us to have a story following Ashley, Tali, Liara, or Garrus. Hell, I’ll even take Cortez.Here’s a trailer featuring character and background art. So far I’m liking the style, and we get to see how the different alien races look like in anime form.

China's ageing population and the "demographic time-bomb"

2012-03-22T11:00:00.001+11:00

I found Tania Branigan's Guardian article on China's coming demographic spasm really interesting. China's One Child policy means that there's a giant cohort of imminent retirees and a much smaller group of young adults of working age who'll have to support them. Combine that with the tradition (and law) of filial piety, which puts responsibility for the elderly on their children, increased life-expectancy, and a shame-taboo against retirement homes, and you've got the makings of some very turbulent times ahead.

China's economic miracle has been fuelled by its "demographic dividend": an unusually high proportion of working age citizens. That population bulge is becoming a problem as it ages. In 2000 there were six workers for every over-60. By 2030, there will be barely two.
Other countries are also ageing and have far lower birth rates. But China is the first to face the issue before it has developed – and the shift is two to three times as fast.
"China is unique: she is getting older before she has got rich," said Wang Dewen, of the World Bank's China social protection team.
Tens of millions of workers have migrated to the cities, creating an even worse imbalance in rural areas which already suffer low incomes, poor public services and minimal social security.
Most old people there rely on their own labour and their children. China not only needs to support more older people for longer, but to extend support to new parts of society. World Bank researchers point to promising advances, such as the national rural pension scheme and the expansion of health insurance.
China can help deal with increased costs by raising its retirement age; at present, only about a fifth of urban women are still working at 55. Improving education should also raise productivity. Some experts believe such measures will be enough to wipe out the "demographic debt". Others wonder if China will begin to welcome immigrants.

China faces 'timebomb' of ageing population

Battlestar Galactica: Blood and Chrome - TV No More :(

2012-03-22T10:56:00.000+11:00

Sorry, Battlestar Galactica, you’ve been grounded.

Syfy has decided not to order to series the prequelBattlestar Galactica: Blood & Chrome.

Although an unofficial trailer screened at WonderCon this past weekend and made its way online, reigniting fan interest, the project will not be moving forward — at least as a TV series.

Dexter Vets Julie Benz and Jaime Murray to Reunite on New Syfy Series Defiance

“We are actively pursuing it as was originally intended: a groundbreaking digital series that will launch to audiences beyond the scope of a television screen. The 90-minute pilot movie will air on Syfy in its entirety at a future date,” Syfy president Mark Stern said in a statement, adding that “our enthusiasm for this ambitious project has not waned.”

The network announced the pickup of a two-hour pilot, which follows the early years of William Adama (played by Skins‘ Luke Pasqualino), nearly a year and a half ago (in October 2010). But because of intensive post-production work, the final product was not delivered until last November, reports Deadline.

New Series of Battlestar Galactica - BSG: Blood and Chrome on the way, with trailer!!

2012-03-21T18:02:00.002+11:00

BSG: Blood and Chrome

OMG! From out of the blue comes a new trailer for a prequal seriers for Battllestar Galactica (an no, it's not that god aweful Caprica series) ... Battlestar Galactica: Blood and Chrome. The story follows young William Adama fighting in the first Cylon War. With David Eick (Exsetutive Producer of the Syfi Series as well as working on an TV adaptation of "Children Of Men") and Michael Taylor (of Star Trek Voyager and BSG S3 fame) it looks pretty rock solid... check out very exciting, all be it rough trailer below.

With a 2 hour pilot in green lit on SyFi (sound fimilar... BSG Fans?) as well as rumors of a Web Only continuation of the series proper this is looking to be some steller stuff from the old BSG crew. I mean they've even confirmed that Bear McCreary has finished the score of the pilot! Uber exciting... I think I may have a chubby.

Stay tuned for more info from TapeMonkey!

Pirate Bay Putting Its Servers In The Air

2012-03-20T11:53:00.002+11:00

In ye olde days, when pirates wore black and swung cutlasses, they’d take to the high seas to avoid the authorities. The Pirate Bay is going to go one better, taking to the high skies by putting its servers up in the arrrr… erm… that is, air.

A blog post on the PirateBay reveals the plan, which at this stage is just experimental, although it’s also described as “A real act of war”. The plan is to use GPS-controlled drones with “tiny computers like the Raspberry Pi” to host the Pirate Bay’s servers, so that any attempt to take the Pirate Bay down would have to involve actually shooting the drones down. The blog post does note that not everything is set up just yet:

We’re just starting so we haven’t figured everything out yet. But we can’t limit ourselves to hosting things just on land anymore. These Low Orbit Server Stations (LOSS) are just the first attempt. With modern radio transmitters we can get over 100Mbps per node up to 50km away. For the proxy system we’re building, that’s more than enough.

But when time comes we will host in all parts of the galaxy, being true to our slogan of being the galaxy’s most resilient system. And all of the parts we’ll use to build that system on will be downloadable.

Memes, Rages Faces and where they come from...

2012-03-13T11:45:00.002+11:00

Once merely obscure inside jokes on the image board 4chan, the "rage face" comics that now appear widely on the Internet have have been toughened by natural selection as they evolved into a dominant species of Internet meme. The amateur cartoons, made using a recurring set of expressive characters, are used by a growing international community. Far from being insignificant doodles, the faces are now an accepted and standardized form of online communication used to tell stories that can be quick and funny or serious and deeply personal.

Because they have become so ubiquitous, and because any surfer worth his salt should have a working knowledge of top Internet memes, we've created this Field Guide to Rage Faces. In any expedition, preparation is key; for Internet adventurers, the ability to tell a “Challenge Accepted” from a “Me Gusta” can make all the difference. So kick off your boots, set your pith helmet aside, and enjoy a snifter of brandy as we explore the evolution, habitat, and social characteristics of rage faces....

...

Here are ten of the most common:

Face	Description
	Cereal Guy: A versatile character, Cereal Guy generally express surly skepticism (if he’s just eating), but he’s been known to spit his cereal everywhere if he is shocked or surprised.
	Forever Alone: Forever Alone is a sad, lonely individual with no friends and few options in life. He can be found in any situation where someone is feeling morose or, as the name implies, alone.
	F--k Yea: Almost the polar opposite of Forever Alone, F--k Yea walks with a swagger that can only come from victory, be it from a major accomplishment or from successfully handling something in everyday life
	Herp Derp: A character no one in the Rage Kingdom enjoys, Herp Derp can sometimes be simply obtuse and dumb, but more commonly he's self-centered, uninformed, and completely sure of himself.
	LOL Guy: An easy guy to understand, LOL Guy howls with laughter at the funny situations he finds in rage comics.
	Me Gusta: His name means “I like” in Spanish, which is exactly what he expresses. Me Gusta can be used to express enjoyment in anything from the perverse (such as odd sexual activities) to the mundane (such as petting a cat).
	Okay Guy: If you’ve ever felt powerless to change something, you understand Okay Guy. He doesn’t stand up for himself in any situation; he simply sighs and put up with what life throws at him.
	Poker Face: Poker Face tries to hide his embarrassment in any awkward or uncomfortable situation, trying to pretend nothing is out of the ordinary as he waits for the situation to resolve itself.
	Rage Guy: One of the most basic characters, Rage Guy expresses pure, blind rage, typically directed at life’s small, everyday annoyances (like Troll Face’s antics). Rage Guy has also spawned several spinoff characters, such as Derp.
	Troll Face: One of the oldest and most widely-used faces, Troll Face is a prankster who makes others' lives more difficult for his own amusement. His wide, toothy grin perpetually snickers at his victims. Full Article...

Smithsonian turns to 3D to bring collection to the world

2012-02-29T17:12:00.002+11:00

With the Pirate Bay, Google and now the Smithsonian releasing 3D models it really makes me want to get one!!! Wow...

With just 2 percent of the Smithsonian's archive of 137 million items available to the public at any one time, an effort is under way at the world's largest museum and research institution to adopt 3D tools to expand its reach around the country. CNET has learned that the Smithsonian has a new initiative to create a series of 3D-printed models, exhibits, and scientific replicas--as well as to generate a new digital archive of 3D models of many of the physical objects in its collection. Representative of that effort, the museum is touting the 3D printed replica of a Thomas Jefferson statue that it recently installed for the "Slavery at Jefferson's Monticello: Paradox of Liberty" exhibit at the National Museum of African American History and Culture. According to the museum, this is the "largest 3D printed museum quality historical replica" on Earth and is a copy of a statue on display at Monticello, the Thomas Jefferson museum in Virginia.

According to Adam Metallo, a 3D digitization coordinator at the Smithsonian, the team working on the Jefferson replica project decided that rather than use a traditional method involving rubber molding and casting, they would utilize modern technologies. Taking a Minolta laser scanner worth well up to $100,000 along, they contracted with Studio EIS to generate an intricately detailed 3D model of the statue that was then turned into the 3D printed replica by RedEye on Demand. Now, with that high-end scanner, as well as less expensive tools that include normal digital cameras and freely available cloud-based digitization software, Metallo and his fellow 3D digitization coordinator Vince Rossi are slowly setting out to begin building a new Smithsonian digital archive. They hope this initiative will eventually lead to scores of 3D printed exhibits, as well as countless 3D models that could theoretically be used in the museums, in schools, or just about anywhere people have an interest in the Smithsonian's vast physical holdings. The only problem? They need more companies that, like RedEye On Demand, have the resources to help bring the efforts to fruition.

The Pirate Bay Switches from Torrents to Untraceable Magnet Links

2012-02-29T14:37:00.002+11:00

The Pirate Bay will no longer link to .torrent files. It will use better technology instead. "Today marks the end of an era," the Pirate Bay blog says. "Sort of." The famed torrent site will now use magnet links. Magnet links don't break as easily, and they're more bandwidth-efficient for people who mirror the linked files.

Oh yeah, and unless a government is willing to shut down a whole Web page using out-and-out censorship tactics, magnet links can't be stopped. Magnet links hash their contents. They're effectively anonymous. There's no file living on The Pirate Bay's servers; it's just a link inside a page. You can pass the link around however you want and open it using any compatible application. No one can tell whether or not you downloaded the file.

The only way to stop magnet links is to actually block the exchange of the link in the first place, i.e. forbid access to a part of The Pirate Bay. And even if that did happen, the magnet links could just pop back up somewhere else. full article...

To help explain what a HASH is and why it's used in these new (ish) magnet files check out the below explanation.

'.torrent' files

For years, BitTorrent clients, trackers and indexers have relied on .torrent files to store information on the files shared with the popular p2p protocol. These files are stored by indexing sites and are used by BitTorrent clients to connect to the tracker sites. The files hold several types of data, a URL of the tracker site, names for the files it shared, as well as hash codes of files.

All of this is used by the client to connect with peers that have the files in the torrent, or portions of them, and also to ensure that the downloaded data is accurate. This system has several disadvantages, some technical, but one of the biggest is that BitTorrent indexers have to store the .torrent files on their servers, which leaves them vulnerable to legal threats if the content shared happens to be infringing despite containing no actual infringing data by themselves.

Magnet links

Magnet links though are just links, they have no files associated with them just data. The links are an evolving URI standard developed primarily to be used by p2p networks. They differ from URLs, for example, in that they don't hold information on the location of a resource but rather on the content of the file or files to which they link. Technically, magnet links are made up of a series of parameters containing various data in no particular order. In the case of BitTorrent, they hold the hash value of the torrent which is then used to locate copies of the files among the peers. They may also hold file name data or links to trackers used by the torrent. You can check out the entry on Wikipedia for a more detailed technical description.

With magnet links, BitTorrent indexers don't have to store any file at all, just a few snippets of data leaving the individual client apps to do all the heavy lifting. In fact, magnet links can be copy-pasted as plain text by users and shared via email, IM or any other medium. For the indexer sites, the allure is clear, using magnet links makes it harder for them to be accused of any wrong-doing in court. Theoretically, magnet links should not have any disadvantages for the users over .torrent files either. It would also potentially make downloads faster as it would enable the clients to download from peers which have identical files but with different names, for example.

As Movies Debut on Facebook, the Era of Social Cinema Begins

2012-02-22T10:43:00.000+11:00

If anybody could pull it off, it would be Tim Heidecker and Eric Wareheim. The comedy duo and stars of the often demented Tim and Eric Awesome Show Great Job! have a rabid and loyal enough fan base that releasing their new movie in an experimental new way just might work.

Tomorrow night, Tim and Eric's Billion Dollar Movie will debut on Facebook, a full two weeks before it arrives in theaters. For $10, fans will be able watch the movie and chat with its stars in real time. The model represents a new sort of social cinema that, while not widespread, appears poised to become a potentially major trend.

Magnolia Pictures, who is releasing the film, is no stranger to the concept of making movies available before they hit theaters. The distributor is accustomed to releasing films via Video on Demand prior to their theatrical release, but this is the first time they've experimented with putting something out on Facebook first. Tim and Eric, they figure, would make an ideal test case.

"Everything that we've done with them has just been huge," said Andrew McGraime, Magnolia's Vice President of Interactive Marketing. We did a Reddit chat, which was the biggest Reddit has had. All of their viral videos have been huge hits."

To make it happen, Magnolia partnered with a company called Milyoni, which specializes in live entertainment events on Facebook. Using its Social Live product, the company sets up streaming content that lives directly within Facebook, as well as deep social integration to encourage fan interaction. By setting everything up on Facebook and streaming the movie at a set time, the opportunity becomes ripe for genuine, real-time social buzz, which can spread across social connections as people see their friends participating and sharing content related to the movie. Full article...

American humans at war with science?

2012-02-21T17:39:00.003+11:00

After reading the below article from The Australian newspapers website I find it hard to completly agree with the sentiment put forth by the author. You've got to agree with a lot of it, but the story does come from a group of scientists based in the US. I don't believe that places like Sweden or even India would be so closed minded about the importance of science to humanities successful future...

Stark warning emerges from science summit - humans at war with science

From:AFP
February 21, 2012 5:10PM

A STARK theme emerged from an annual scientific get-together in Vancouver: the world must be helped to believe in science again or it could be too late to save our planet.

Science is "under siege," top academics and educators were warned repeatedly at the American Association for the Advancement of Science summit as they were urged to better communicate their work to the public.

Scientific solutions are needed to solve global crises - from food and water shortages to environmental destruction - "but the public now does not understand science," leading US climate change expert James Hansen told the meeting.

"We have a planetary emergency, and very few people recognise that."

The theme of the five-day meeting, attended by some 8000 scientists from 50 countries, was
"Flattening the world - building a global knowledge society."

"It's about persuading people to believe in science, at a time when disturbing numbers don't," said meeting co-chair Andrew Petter, president of Simon Fraser University in this western Canadian city.

Experts wrangled with thorny issues such as censorship, opposition from religious groups in the United States to teaching evolution and climate change, and generally poor education standards.

"We have to plan for a future, considering the risk of climate change, with nine to 10 billion people," said Hans Rosling, a Swedish public health expert famous for combating scientific ignorance with catchy YouTube videos.

Rosling, pointing to charts showing how human populations changed with technology and how without science the majority of a family's children die, said it's naive to think that humanity can easily go backward in history. full article...

A New, New ... err New remake of Space Battleship Yamoto coming to JP Theatres

2012-02-21T14:49:00.000+11:00

Let's remake the remake of a remake that started it all. Another new Space Battleship Yamoto TV show and film is nearly out (2012-04-07) and it looks really amazing. From the teaser trailer that's currently streaming on Amazon.co.jp (and swiped by some good Youtuber) ... it seems that the 3D look of the previous film remake has been updated to look more like the traditional animation. This most likely stems from the Yutaka Izubuchi the Chief Director on the project who worked on the mechanical designs and scifi ideas from older renditions of the franchise.

The April 7 film is actually the first two episodes of the new television series, combined into one theatrical preview screening about 50 minutes long. I don't know if I would go to a theater to watch what I could be watching at home on Blu-Ray days later but I can understand the appeal. Check of the trailer below and think back to better times filled with hollow shouts of ..."ISCANDAR!!!"I can never get tired of those classic early 20th Century battleship designs.

A New Spin on Things

2012-02-01T17:12:00.000+11:00

It's been a fair while since TapeMonkey has been updated but I've decided to have another go at it with a slightly different spin. There's still going to be tech updates, and nerdy news but I'm also going to start posting more about my new garden and the success and failures with my vegetable garden out the front of our unit in Northern Melbourne. Along side the garden I'll include some stuff that I've been cooking.. it may include stuff from the garden, it may not but hey I'll all look good :)

After seening an interview with Indira Nasdoo, a local Australian new reader, about her new book "The Edible Balcony" I got inspired to get stuck in and change out front garden into something that will actually start providing produce for our little family. I mean, I've got way more then a tiny little inner city balcony and by the sounds of it she's able to produce almost enough food to save her from shopping.

So moving forward without even opening a cover of the book that inspired me this lil nerd started getting his hands dirty too see what exactly he could make out of his front garden.

Our unit is in the Northern Suburbs of Melbourne Australia and is Nth Facing. The front is approx 1.5 meters wide and 12 meters long, so just a standard front garden. Here's a picture of one side of our front garden.

To start I'm going try and grow the following things...

Carrots
Corn
Chili's (as many kinds I can find)
Stacks of herbs
Lemons, Lime & Oranges (Hybrid trees... way to go!)
Pumpkins
Tomatos

I'll keep updating the site with my progress, and any tips I discover along the way.

New Avatar! The Last Airbender: Legend of Korra Trailer

2011-07-26T15:45:00.002+10:00

I’m still kicking myself for missing yesterday’s Comic-Con panel for The Last Airbender: Legend of Korra, but at least we can all now feast in the trailer that premiered there. As a huge fan of the original Avatar: The Last Airbender, I’m happy to report that Korra looks like a gorgeous and mature follow-up.

The trailer opens up with some epic imagery, including a giant statue of a grown-up Aang (the original series’ main character), and a flying bison (no clue if it’s Appa). We see Korra, the new Avatar, leaving her home in the Southern Water Tribe and making her way to the United Republic. That city was founded by Aang and Zuko (the tortured “evil” prince from the first series) as a place meant for members of all tribes to live, our friends over atUGO reported from the panel.

We also see several action beats in the trailer, and it looks like the choreography will be even more intricate this time around. The animation also appears to be improved over the original Airbender series — it seems more on the level of a big-budget anime TV series like Full Metal Alchemist now.

Unlike Aang, Korra seems to be a thorough badass with an attitude — a nice shift that hints things will be more mature in this series. Her main animal pal is a polar bear dog (yup) named Naga, and the creators say flying lemurs will also make an appearance at some point.

The villains of the series are an anti-bending group, “The Equalists”, who are led by a mysterious masked man named Oman (seen at the end of the trailer). His henchman use Chi Blocking techniques (similar to Ty Lee from the original series), according to The Last Airbender online.

Toph, the Earthbender from the original series who discovered the Metalbending technique, is now traveling the world creating an elite Metalbending SWAT team. Toph’s daughter is the chief of police in the city, where she manages a team of Metalbending cops.

The panel also revealed that Aang and Katara had three kids, though Tenzin (voiced by J.K. Simmons) is the only Airbender. He has three kids of his own who are all Airbenders (plus another on the way). Music in the series will once again be handled by The Track Team, and they say the music will sound as if New Orleans-style Jazz was invented in China during the 1920s.

Unfortunately, there’s still no premiere date for Legend of Korra. To tide you over until then, check out the screenshots I grabbed from the trailer below.

Looks more adult and more anime to me, brilliant!

Jaume Collet-Serra in Talks For WB’s Rebudgeted Live-Action ‘Akira’

2011-07-15T11:13:00.003+10:00

Is the live-action Akira dead, or is it not? That status has been a big question markmore than once in the past couple years as directors and screenwriters have tried to develop a new Americanized live-action version of the classic manga and anime byKatsuhiro Otomo.

Now we know that the new version is very much alive, as WB is looking to Jaume Collet-Serra, the director of Orphan and the Liam Neeson action thriller Unknown, to direct Akira.

Variety has the report, saying that the budget for the film has been pulled back to about $90m — that’s down considerably from what was looking like a $150m movie in its most recent incarnation when Albert Hughes was going to direct.

It sounds as if the latest script, by Harry Potter screenwriter Steve Kloves, is still in play. (Book of Eli writer Gary Whitta wrote an early draft, and Albert Torres and Mark Fergus & Hawk Ostby also wrote drafts.) The film will still be set in New Manhattan, with Variety describing the story only as following “the leader of a biker gang who saves his friend from a medical experiment.” So that’s all info that hasn’t changed in the past month or two.

And still we have zip for casting info. That will still be one of the big points of concern and curiosity for many. Based on what we know, be prepared for actors who are (a) white and (b) older than the characters in either previous incarnation of the story. If you’re not ready to accept both of those points, best to just ignore this one altogether, at least until there is some footage to demonstrate how it all turned out.

Can we predict how it might turn out based on this directorial choice? Jaume Collet-Serra’s star is certainly rising, assisted by the fact that Orphan and Unknown both performed well, with the latter turning up $130 globally on a $30m budget. That sort of frugal performer makes studios happy, and if Jaume Collet-Serra can keep that profit proportion while tripling his Unknown budget for Akira, WB will do OK.

But will the story be in good hands? I like the idea of Steve Kloves scripting as he’s proved several times that he can really condense material well. But Collet-Serra didn’t quite manage the deeply silly aspects of Unknown. Enough of Akira has the potential to also look ridiculous on screen that the wisdom of this choice will have to be proven as the project moves forward.

Thanks Slashfilm

BioShock Infinite: 15 Minutes of Gameplay Footage

2011-07-11T11:12:00.002+10:00

Here's a new 15 minutes piece of gameplay footage from this years E3 for the upcoming Bioshock Infinite. It looks absolutely amazing and if you haven't already pre-ordered this bad boy than what are you doing still reading this blog! Go to Amazon or JBhifi now damnit!

China looking to buy a chunk of Facebook...

2011-07-11T09:53:00.002+10:00

News surfaced yesterday that a sovereign wealth fund representing the Chinese government wants to buy a substantial amount of Facebook stock. According to anonymous sources to Business Insider, China wants to own enough of Facebook "to matter."

What does that mean? It is important to note that a sovereign wealth fund may represent a government but is not the actual government, as Business Insider reporter Nicholas Carlson points out. Is China's interest in Facebook a simply a government-sponsored group of venture capitalists looking to get a piece of the upcoming Facebook IPO or is there something more complicated at work behind the scenes?

Full article from Read Write Web...

Article from Forbes

The Map Of Human Impact On Planet Earth

2011-07-01T10:44:00.003+10:00

This visualisation of Earth – made by anthropologist Félix Pharand – shows urban areas, shipping routes, global roads and air networks. It gives a very good idea on how big our species’ physical impact on the planet really is.

So big, in fact, that scientists are thinking about starting a new geological era: The Anthropocene.

The new era’s name (anthropo- means human and -cene means new) refers to the effect of humans on Earth ecosystems, including the transformation of terrain and life all around us. I find it a bit too cocky – since Earth could probably wipe out any evidence of our existence in a couple thousand years and not even blink – but I guess it works given the current circumstances.

Silicon Valley's secret military history

2011-06-29T10:41:00.000+10:00

The psychedelic history of Silicon Valley is well-told in two recent fantastic books, John Markoff's What The Dormouse Said and Fred Turner's From Counterculture to Cyberculture. But there's another somewhat darker parallel history too. In this video from a 2008 talk at the Computer History Museum, Steve Blank explores the shadowy military roots of the Bay Area's high tech hub. "Secret History of Silicon Valley" (Thanks, Jacques Vallée!)

It's long so kick back and relax...

Real or Unreal,. that is the Japanese Pop question...

2011-06-24T13:19:00.003+10:00

This is Eguchi Aimi. She’s the latest of the Japanese pop group AKB48 and a very lovely girl. But Eguchi Aimi is not what she seems. This Sunday, she shocked all her fans revealing her dark secret. You’ve to watch this.

This is Eguchi Aimi. She’s the latest of the Japanese pop group AKB48 and a very lovely girl. But Eguchi Aimi is not what she seems. This Sunday, she shocked all her fans revealing her dark secret. You’ve to watch this.

Look at this video closely. You can see the seven members of AKB48 advertising some Japanese candy. Among them, centre stage, is the lovely girl that you can see in the gallery and on top, Eguchi Aimi. She looks just like the others, all big eyes, juicy lips, perfect cheeks, cute chin, blinding smile and angelical look. Look at her sing. So cute.

The great pretender

The fact is that yes, she looks exactly like the others. Literally. The big eyes, the juicy lips, the perfect cheeks, the cute chin, the blinding smile and the angelical look belong to the other six member of AKB48. Eguchi Aimi is not a real person, she has been composed in a computer using parts from the humans in AKB48. Her fans, who are legion, just learn about it this week, when this shocking video demonstrating the process, was published in YouTube:

The synthesis and post-production that have gone into Eguchi is simply uncanny. Taking 150 gigabytes of memory, she’s the perfect example of the world we are going to head, in which men and machine, “reality” and “reality” will collide in a new way that would make humans blend into the digital world and the digital world come into the flesh and bones.

And while the Eguchi Aimi phenomenon may be just anecdotical, the fact that a synthetic creation has been able to make their fans to have crushes and feelings without them never realising she was a figment of someone’s imagination, a digital mutant mix, is not a simple anecdote. That’s very real. When people perceive such a being as real, and that being causes an emotive response in them, then that makes that character part of reality.

The fact is that all this is not science fiction anymore. It’s science. And just a matter of time before there’s a huge jump that puts together synthetic lifeforms out of the screen and into the physical world. “A new world of machines and possibilities!” as Dalí said in his futurist manifesto.

And, as we walk into this new world, I can’t help but to ask myself: Would I be able to fall in love with a synthetic being? Would you? And what will happen then, when humans and digitals collide and merge?

It’s been the subject of movies and books for most of the 20th century. But literature and film is one thing. Watching it happening right in front of you is quite different. [Singularity Hub]

New Official ‘The Hobbit’ Photos of Bilbo Baggins and Gandalf the Grey

2011-06-24T13:15:00.001+10:00

Thank the elves that Peter Jackson is doing another Tolkien movie. I’m already feeling the hype for The Hobbit after already watching The Fellowship of the Ring extended last week and The Two Towers extended this past week in theaters. Next week is going to conclude with the debut of LOTR Trilogy on Blu-ray and Return of the King extended in theaters on Tuesday, June 28th.

Finally, our first look at the official photos of Martin Freeman as Bilbo Baggins and Ian McKellen as Gandalf the Grey. Each image for The Hobbit contains Peter Jackson’s comments.

”He fits the ears, and he’s got some very nice feet,” Jackson says of his Bilbo. ”I think he’s got the biggest hobbit feet we’ve had so far. They’re a little bit hard to walk in, but he’s managed to figure out the perfect hobbit gait.”

”He’s in fantastic form,” Peter Jackson says of McKellen. ”In a way, his role in The Hobbit has more technical difficulties than Lord of the Rings did, because he has scenes with 14 smaller characters — obviously the dwarves and the hobbit are shorter… I remember saying to him [laughs], ”Look, this isn’t Waiting for Godot or King Lear. This is The Hobbit. This is the real thing.”

”There’s no way you can pace yourself for shoots like these,” Jackson says. ”When we were going through the schedule for The Hobbit, I felt a terrible drop in my stomach when I saw that we’d be shooting for 254 days. We’re only 12 days short of The Lord of the Rings even though we’re only doing two movies. When I saw that, I had to sort of pick myself up off the floor and carry on.”

The Hobbit hits theaters on December 14, 2012 and December 2013.

Source: EW

Thin film coating makes everlasting energy a piezoelectric possibility

2011-06-23T17:45:00.000+10:00

Let's be honest, it's no big secret that we're running out of dead dinosaurs to fuel our lives. And with recent natural catastrophes proving atomic energy isn't what you'd call 'safe,' it's a good thing the researchers down at the RMIT University in Melbourne have been hard at work figuring out how to turn you into a self-sustained energy source. Marrying piezoelectrics with a thin film microchip coating, those scientists Down Under have for the first time identified just how much energy your pressure can generate. This is certainly not the first time the tech has been put to use -- Orange UK's been doing something similar, albeit bulkier, for the Glastonbury fest each year. What are some practical uses, you ask? Imagine a gym powered by a sea of workout-hamsters, each producing significant energy from the soles of their feet. Curious for more? Try a pacemaker that runs solely on blood pressure, or a laptop charged by banging out Facebook updates. Who knows, maybe even RIM can put this to use in its next Storm. Just sayin'.

Link to RMIT

Link to source article

Is The Rise Of Wearable Electronics Finally Here?

2011-06-22T16:42:00.002+10:00

For decades I’ve wanted interesting, beautiful, and (sometimes) functional electronics on the most personal geographies of all, myself. When I think of “living in the future”, it’s what springs to mind: subtle LEDs, lots of polished metal.

Here are some milestones, mistakes, and projects in the world of wearable electronics. From geeky watches to wearable music players – I’ve always wanted to utilise my wrist real estate to my shoes for electronics of some kind. Many of the “wearables” I’m going to share are from my project archives, some are now “real,” and others are products that are out now. I think we’re finally entering an era where wearable electronics can look good and work well.

Top image via Jlndrr on Flickr

As my friend Bryce recently said:

As the price for enabling components drops, always-on connectivity in our pockets and purses increases, and access to low-cost manufacturing resources and know-how rises we’ll see innovation continue to push into these most personal forms of computing. From pedometers to cufflinks and from connected ski goggles to connected watches the rise of the wearables is upon us…

Now, this is a long article so I won't post it all here now.. check out the full thing here.