Listen to the Podcast here!
The New Apple iPod Touch
On Wednesday, Apple released updated versions of their iPod lineup, which surprised a lot of people who thought the iPods were dead. The big update came with the iPod Touch, which was updated with the new 64-bit A8 chip, improved front and back cameras, and a new 128GB storage option. In addition, the new iPods come in some fancy colors – silver, gold, blue, and pink, which some are thinking could be a hint at the upcoming iPhone 6S release. Check it all out here!
Social media with authenticity: Beme launches today
[WATCH MY VIDEO ABOUT BEME HERE!] Prolific vlogger and short film maker, Casey Neistat has launched an app that he hopes will be the vehicle for serious social media change. It’s called “Beme” (pronounced “Beam”) and it’s aim is to allow you to share your life without the fake, bloated, non-realistic, and self-image boosting junk.
The app is simple. Hold your iPhone against your body and it films whatever it’s pointed at for four seconds and then immediately posts it to your feed. You can’t see it before you post it and once it’s viewed by someone, they can’t see it again. Poof!
Casey had spent spent the last several months posting a personal vlog on his YouTube channel in anticipation of his new company, which he hasn’t talked much about until recently, because, as Neistat himself says in a recent vlog, “we had to make sure we got our domain”. I absolutely understand. Domain squatters are not cool people.
He is well known for having hundreds of thousands of SnapChat followers as well as a recent surge in his YouTube subscriptions, pushing him well over 800,000 subscribers and counting. By mid afternoon on Friday, July 17th, 2015, it was a top trending app on the App Store, trending on Twitter, and had even surpassed the Tumblr app on the App Store. Only time will tell if Beme is the next big contender in the social media space, or one giant pretender. Check it out on the app store!
Pluto. Spotted!
After 9.5 years and 3 billion miles, New Horizons arrived, and quickly left Pluto! What was once a tiny dot has now come into focus, revealing unbelievable detail of both Pluto and its largest moon, Charon. We would be remiss not to mention this incredible moment in history. IT’S FOR PLUTO! See the latest images here.
How NASA captures space images using Photoshop
The official Photoshop Twitter account Tweeting this article from Resource Magazine that details how NASA prepares their images for the public’s eye. What most don’t realize, is that the images that are beamed back to Earth are often very small and not in true color. This is because the camera technology on some of the telescopes and probes are quite outdated and some are built to capture very specific wavelengths that are invisible to the Human eye. Because of this, people like Robert Hurt are tasked with colorizing the images based on the data that’s available.
“What we have done for a lot of the infrared data sets that come through is that we will preserve the relative ordering of light. For example, red light has a longer wavelength than blue light. Adjust things properly and you have a color image. This is really how the understanding of how color works and how the eye interacts with color and how the human perception of color works, helps you make decisions.”
Amazon Prime Fails
On July 15th, Amazon launched their first “Prime Day”, which they claimed would be bigger than Black Friday. For the most part, while they may have been selling more items than Black Friday, it was filled with items that only 86 year olds would care to purchase. The ‘top ticket’ items that were talked about sold out within seconds, and it didn’t seem like they had very many of them.
This was clearly a marketing scheme to not only get rid of a bunch of items that they had piling up, but also increase their Prime membership sales. Did it work? For Amazon, probably, but to the consumer, it was a major fail! Read how people reacted on Twitter right here.
World Emoji Day 30+ New Emoji!
Friday was world emoji day, besides the ridiculousness of having a commemoration day for EVERY LAST THING on earth, there are a number of new emoji that are coming out. Among the new release will be emoji like Drooling face, Nauseated face, and Clown face. Do you enjoy using emoji, or is it overdone?
Google’s Free Website Builder
Google has released what looks like an incredible web design tool called, Material Design Lite, which makes creating a website dead simple-or so they tell me. I haven’t tried using it yet, but it sounds like it’s a highly customizable series of code blocks that you can drag and drop into place to create a sleek, modern website in a flash.
Google has a series of templates you can build from and you can customize them to fit your project perfectly. It should be noted that this is a builder that uses Googles “Material Design” which has a specific look to it and I think would really be almost a perfect continuation from the Android OS which would provide Android users in particular a fantastic experience within your website. The whole process looks very promising and should be a valuable tool for any web designer looking for a unique tool to help with layout and design. PRO TIP: Material Design Lite is not nearly as simple as something like Squarespace, and even WordPress to a certain extent. It’s a different way to build a website, but if you have any kind of background in coding, you shouldn’t have much of an issue with it.
Woman sues director over viral video
A while back, a video went viral showing a woman walking down a street in NY, as a countless number of hit on her, asked for her number. She apparently responded to a Craigslist ad and was paid $200 for her involvement in the project, but now she’s suing the director for $500,000, claiming she didn’t receive what she was promised, and didn’t give written permission for them to use her in the video. See the full story here.
Colorblind man sees purple for the first time thanks to Enchroma
Speaking of pink iPods, certain people who are colorblind would not be able to see the new snazzy pink iPod, but new technology is making it possible for them to see colors are they should be seen! A company called Enchroma has been in and out of the news over the last year, and this week a video was released of a colorblind man who received a pair of their glasses as a birthday present, and we experienced him seeing certain colors, especially purple for the very first time. In short, these glasses work by oversaturating certain colors that colorblind individuals typically wouldn’t be able to see, allowing them to view them as someone who is not colorblind would.
They sell for around $400, and from the videos and reviews I’ve researched, it seems like it’s the real deal! Seeing where this technology may go is very interesting. I would imagine that the next step would be to introduce a clear lens, then eventually squeeze it into a contact lens. Watch the video here!
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