Year: 2016

Chefs do that”: The underappreciated holiday joy of “The Long Kiss Goodnight

Chefs do that”: The underappreciated holiday joy of “The Long Kiss Goodnight

Published by Sam Flores

At some point within the next 72 hours my annual ritual of cookie baking will commence. Everything is made from scratch, and the creation and baking of each confection must be scheduled. The oven will be preheated to 350 degrees by around noon and won’t turn off until the flour or the butter is gone and the last gingerbread man is finished. Only when the ammo runs out does the day end. This campaign kicks off with my husband ceremonially breaking out the DVD of our favorite holiday movie, a story that celebrates the domestic arts and femininity in an entirely sideways fashion: “The Long Kiss Goodnight,” the 1996 action flick starring Geena Davis and Samuel L. Jackson. Many people have never seen “The Long Kiss Goodnight,” let alone heard of it. Those who have may find the above description puzzling, given its plot. Not the part about it being a Christmas movie, which it is in the same way that “Die Hard”  and “Lethal Weapon” are Yuletide flicks.  The bullets start flying about a …

Protect your privacy during Trump’s reign: A hacker’s guide to being cyber-safe

Protect your privacy during Trump’s reign: A hacker’s guide to being cyber-safe

Published by Sam Flores

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Protecting individual privacy from government intrusion is older than American democracy. In 1604, the attorney general of England, Sir Edward Coke, ruled that a man’s house is his castle. This was the official declaration that a homeowner could protect himself and his privacy from the king’s agents. That lesson carried into today’s America, thanks to our Founding Fathers’ abhorrence for imperialist Great Britain’s unwarranted search and seizure of personal documents. They understood that everyone has something to hide, because human dignity and intimacy don’t exist if we can’t keep our thoughts and actions private. As citizens in the digital age, that is much more difficult. Malicious hackers and governments can monitor the most private communications, browsing habits and other data breadcrumbs of anyone who owns a smartphone, tablet, laptop or personal computer. President-elect Donald Trump’s criticism of encryption technology and interest in expanding government surveillance have technologists and civil libertarians deeply concerned. As an ethical hacker, my job is to help protect those who are unable, or …

How to outsmart fake news in your Facebook feed

How to outsmart fake news in your Facebook feed

Published by skeptic

CNN  —  Just because it’s on the internet doesn’t make it true. It seems so simple, but if everyone knew that, Facebook and Google wouldn’t have to pull bogus news sites from their advertising algorithms and people wouldn’t breathlessly share stories that claim Donald Trump is a secret lizard person or Hillary Clinton is an android in a pantsuit. It doesn’t have to be this way. Fake news is actually really easy to spot – if you know how. Consider this your New Media Literacy Guide. NOTE: As we put this together, we sought the input of two communications experts: Dr. Melissa Zimdars, an associate professor at Merrimack College in Massachusetts whose dynamic list of unreliable news sites has gone viral, and Alexios Mantzarlis, the head of the International Fact-Checking Network at the Poynter Institute. First, know the different types of misleading and false news 1. Fake news These are the easiest to debunk and often come from known sham sites that are designed to look like real news outlets. They may include misleading photographs …

‘Roborace’ car makes street track debut in Marrakech

‘Roborace’ car makes street track debut in Marrakech

Published by skeptic

Story highlights Driverless electric racer completes successful track test in Marrakech, Morocco Planned Roborace series will see autonomous cars compete at Formula E ePrix weekends CNN  —  It is a car kitted out with technology its developers boldly predict will transform our cities and change the way we live. The autonomous “DevBot #1” took a giant leap forward in Morocco recently, making its debut on a street track at the Formula E Marrakech ePrix. The battery-powered prototype is being tested for Roborace – a proposed race series where driverless cars will compete on temporary city circuits. “It’s the first time we’ve run the Devbot in driverless mode on a Formula E track in the middle of a city street,” Roborace’s Justin Cooke told CNN. “It’s so exciting for the team who put hours and hours of work in. These guys were up to 1-2 a.m. in the morning developing a technology that no one else in the world is able to do at this speed and in these complicated environments.” Read: Electric race car showcases …

What parents should know about the VR gear kids want

What parents should know about the VR gear kids want

Published by skeptic

Story highlights Virtual reality headsets range from inexpensive Cardboard to pricey PlayStation Here are your options if you want to dip your toe in or really swim with the VR big fish Thinking about treating your family to a little virtual reality this holiday? Have no idea where to start? Don’t worry. From Google’s inexpensive Cardboard VR viewer to Sony’s new PlayStation VR, this guide will help you figure out what makes sense for your family’s interests, needs, and budget. Here are your options if you want to dip your toe in the water, wade knee-deep, or really swim with the VR big fish. Keep in mind, virtual reality is a quickly changing technology, so always check out the companies’ websites, professional reviews on sites like CNET, and user reviews before you take the leap. Virtual reality viewers are inexpensive, handheld devices that offer three-dimensional views and the feeling of being in a different place. The viewers’ lenses work by extending the depth of static images or animation but do not allow you to interact …

Girls to design Africa’s first private space satellite

Girls to design Africa’s first private space satellite

Published by skeptic

Story highlights Africa will launch its first private satellite into space It’s been built by schoolgirls CNN  —  They may be teenagers, but 17-year-old Brittany Bull and 16-year-old Sesam Mngqengqiswa have grand ambitions – to launch Africa’s first private satellite into space in 2019. They are part of a team of high school girls from Cape Town, South Africa, who have designed and built payloads for a satellite that will orbit over the earth’s poles scanning Africa’s surface. Once in space, the satellite will collect information on agriculture, and food security within the continent. Using the data transmitted, “we can try to determine and predict the problems Africa will be facing in the future”, explains Bull, a student at Pelican Park High School. “Where our food is growing, where we can plant more trees and vegetation and also how we can monitor remote areas,” she says. “We have a lot of forest fires and floods but we don’t always get out there in time.” Information received twice a day will go towards disaster prevention. It’s …

Cell phones and screens are keeping your kid awake

Cell phones and screens are keeping your kid awake

Published by skeptic

Story highlights Devices in the bedroom are associated with children losing sleep time and quality, new research says Even children and teens who don’t stay up late online are losing sleep CNN  —  These days, teachers often face classrooms filled with yawning students who stayed up late snapping selfies or playing online games. For children and teens, using cell phones, tablets and computers at night is associated with losing sleep time and sleep quality, new research finds. Even children who don’t use their phones or the other technologies littering their bedrooms at night are losing shut-eye and becoming prone to daylight sleepiness, the analysis published today in JAMA Pediatrics finds. The analysis found “a consistent pattern of effect across a wide range of countries and settings,” said Dr. Ben Carter, lead author and a senior lecturer in biostatistics at King’s College London. Carter and his colleagues weeded through the medical literature to identify hundreds of applicable studies conducted between January 1, 2011, and June 15, 2015. They chose 20 research reports involving a total of …