Q101 The Alternative
Q101 (formerly on Chicago radio @ 101.1 FM) The Alternative - Chicago's New Rock Alternative - Everything Alternative - Chicago's Alternative - Gen X - Generation X
Aiming to do away with the need to remember passwords for growing numbers of online services, Intel researchers have put together a tablet with new software and a biometric sensor that recognizes the unique patterns of veins on a person’s palm.
Making laptops, tablets and smartphones responsible for identifying users would take the requirement of remembering passwords away from individual websites. It would do away with the need to individually enter passwords into each of them, said Sridhar Iyengar, Director of Security Research at Intel Labs.
The palm-reading technology, still under development, requires new software and biometric sensors built into consumer devices, but does not require the development of any new kinds of chips.
READ MORE
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/09/13/intel-hand-password_n_1881811.html?utm_hp_ref=technology
“Pay that $17.65 you owe us or GO DIRECTLY TO JAIL. Do not pass Go. Do not collect $200.” Debt collectors and district attorneys are teaming up to bully bad-check writers into paying their debt.
In a practice that has spread to more than 300 prosecutors’ offices, collection companies are sending signed letters on D.A. letterhead that threaten jail time unless the check writers settle up and pay for a “financial accountability” class, reported the New York Times.
In the arrangement between debt collectors and district attorneys, the agencies secure their share plus the class fee and the district attorneys get paid by the agencies or receive a share of the money collected, reported the Times.
Above the Law pointed out the potential conundrum of threatening someone with imprisonment on prosecutor letterhead before a lawyer has even considered the case. District attorneys explained to the Times that the letters reduce their caseload, and that only those who ignore merchant warnings are contacted.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/09/17/debt-collectors-threaten-_n_1891030.html?utm_hp_ref=business#slide=1520323
3D printing is a process of making three dimensional solid objects from a digital model. 3D printing is achieved using additive processes, where an object is created by laying down successive layers of material. 3D printing is considered distinct from traditional machining techniques (subtractive processes) which mostly rely on the removal of material by drilling, cutting etc.
The technology is not new. They’ve been used to make manufacturing and engineering prototypes for more than 25 years. But printer makers are now turning their attention to the consumer market, and have been rewarded with soaring sales and stock prices — as well as the prospect of lucrative buyouts.
Some printers capable of churning out simple items such as keychains, wine bottle holders and missing board game pieces are already selling for as little as $350. That’s cheaper than a high-end version of Microsoft’s Xbox 360 with Kinect.
Copyright holders will cringe, but people are already using printers to make Star Wars battle cruisers or a cheaper alternative to Lego or Mattel Inc toys.
Currently, though, the process is slow — about 45 minutes to make something the size of an egg, and about four hours to create an item the size of a soft drink can.
WATCH A DEMO
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/09/13/3d-printing_n_1881710.html?utm_hp_ref=technology
Didja ever think Punk Rock would affect art as we know it? Be considered a “major influence” on how imagery evolved throughout the 70′s and 80′s? How could it not? Punk visual art can include anything from crudely scribbled letters to shockingly jarring figures drawn with sharp points everywhere. Often images and figures are cut and pasted from magazines to create a scene and the colors are often two tone and deeply contrasting.
The main aesthetic of punk art seems to be to either shock, create a sense of empathy or revulsion, make a grander point with an acidic or sarcastic wit, poke fun at politics, political factions, or social factions.
An upcoming exhibition at the Haywood Gallery in London titled “Someday All the Adults Will Die!” shows how the movement affected illustration, art and print just as much as sales of tartan trousers. The exhibit begins this weekend and runs through October.
Some of the pieces featured in this exhibit are shown here.
http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2012/09/11/punk-art_n_1873519.html?utm_hp_ref=arts&ir=Arts
Yes. It is. Fo sho. ART. Serious art connoisseurs have a vested interest in keeping stuff like this out of galleries and museums. It just doesn’t fit with their image of themselves as soldiers in the noble war against vulgarity and dumbed-down mainstream culture.
Richard Phillips is aware of this. He knows art critics find it hard to believe that his giant paintings of tabloid celebrity Lindsay Lohan, Victoria’s Secret model Adriana Lima, and former porn star Sasha Grey can actually be considered Art with a capital “A.”
Phillips’ latest show, “First Point,” opened at the Gagosian Gallery in London. A huge crowd, heavy on celebrities, art stars and Fashion Week refugees, jammed in to gawk at Phillips’ 11-foot-tall paintings of the aforementioned women, each notorious in her own way. The portraits of Lima were based on photographs Phillips shot forVisionaire magazine, and the paintings of Lohan and Grey were based on stills from three videos he made with the actresses, which were shown in two screening rooms at the gallery.
Phillips didn’t choose the stills themselves — they were selected by editors around the world, who pulled screen shots to illustrate their coverage of the videos when they were first released earlier this year.
The seriousness with which he treats Lohan, Lima and Grey prompts a series of uncomfortable questions: Why do I know who these women are? Why do so many of us care so much about them? What is it that makes millions of people love them, and millions of others hate them? If I do find them beautiful, why does that also make me feel guilty?
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-hogan/lindsay-lohan-adriana-lima_b_1878572.html?utm_hp_ref=entertainment#slide=1511627
Once believed long lost, a ”legendary” demo of Sex Pistols’ highly controversial song “Belsen Was a Gas“ has now surfaced on the Internet.
Reportedly penned by Sex Pistols bassist Sid Vicious before he joined the influential punk rock band, the song is about a Nazi concentration camp in Germany. Until recently, only live recordings and a soundtrack version featuring train robber Ronnie Biggs on vocals had existed.
The original demo version of the song features band frontman Johnny Rotten on vocals and Vicious on bass. Rotten later admitted the song had been in poor taste — even for a band infamous for their unapologetic shock tactics and controversial music.
According to music magazine NME, the demo track has been restored and will feature on the box set deluxe reissue of the band’s seminal album “Never Mind The Bollocks, Here’s The Sex Pistols.”
The box set is out on Sept. 24th in celebration of the iconic album’s 35th anniversary.
HEAR THE DEMO
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/09/11/belsen-was-a-gas-sex-pistols-demo_n_1874276.html?utm_hp_ref=entertainment
Before you down that pint, check the shape of your glass—you might be drinking more beer than you realize. According to a new study of British beer drinkers, an optical illusion caused by the shape of a curved glass can dramatically increase the speed at which we swill.
Binge drinking is on the rise says experimental psychologist Angela Attwood of the University of Bristol. There is a proportionate rate in the increase of crime to alcohol consumption. Attwood suspected that the shape of a beer glass, which can give the appearance of different volumes to the same amount of liquid, might also distort perception of how much alcohol is being consumed.
To test the hypothesis, she and her colleagues randomly divided 160 young, healthy people—students and faculty members of the University of Bristol, as well as some members of the general public—into eight groups. Volunteers were easy to get. FREE BEER AND LEMONADE tends to convince persons to be guinea pigs. They were then video recorded drinking. They assigned each group to drink either lager or soft drink from straight or curved glasses. While the participants drank, they watched a nature documentary deemed emotionally neutral, so that they wouldn’t be “sitting there with nothing to do but drink,” Attwood says.
After watching video of both sessions and recording how much time it took for the drinkers to finish their beer or sodas, Attwood’s team found that one group consistently drank much faster than the others: the group drinking a full glass of lager out of curved flute glasses.
Attwood believes that the reason for the increase in speed is that the halfway point in a curved glass is ambiguous. Social beer drinkers, she says, naturally tend to pace themselves when drinking alcohol, judging their speed by how fast they reach half-full. Another experiment in which participants were asked to judge different levels of fluid in photographs of straight and curved glasses showed that people consistently misjudge the volume in fluted glasses, Attwood says.
Not included in the study? Drinking from cans. Drinking from bottles. Drinking from Red Solo Cups at parties.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/09/02/beer-drinkers-curved-glasses_n_1850203.html
Wanna part with some cash for no good reason? This little android could be YOURS to control with your OWN Android Phone!
Have your credit card ready and select your color. See the demo here!
WATCH HERE
http://videos.huffingtonpost.com/tech/control-this-tiny-android-with-your-android-517458213
In a just-released clip from the “Avengers” Blu-ray/DVD, fans are offered an alternate opening sequence to the Joss Whedon film, one that presents an entirely different narrative structure than what wound up onscreen. Here, Maria Hill (Cobie Smulders) is being interrogated 48 hours after the events that concluded “The Avengers” and she’s quite displeased with Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson) and The Avengers Initiative — this despite the superheros having saved New York and the world from Loki and his army of Chitauri.
The scene sets “The Avengers” up as a story told from Hill’s point of view; as any of the millions who saw the summer’s biggest hit in theaters can attest, that’s far from the case.
“The Avengers” Blu-ray and DVD comes out on September 25.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/08/28/the-avengers-alternate-opening_n_1837328.html?utm_hp_ref=entertainment
A self portrait EVERY DAY for 17 straight years. On March 30, 1995, Bryan Lewis Saunders embarked on an art project that he planned to continue for the rest of his life — to create a new self-portrait every single day. Intrigued by how our environments can shape our self-perception, the artist has created thousands of portraits since he began his project.
He has organized his portraits into various series reflecting his mental states at the time, touching on everything from anxiety to love.
Huffington Post found the series “Drugs,” the most intriguing of all. In it, Saunders took a different narcotic everyday and drew himself under the influence of the particular substance. He dosed himself with just about everything imaginable, from huffing lighter fluid to taking psychedelic mushrooms — there was nothing he wouldn’t try. The artist admitted to Fast Company, “I think drugs make me look really ugly.”
There’s also a video montage with a collection of over 3,000 of his portraits.
SEE IT
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/08/24/bryan-lewis-saunders-has-_n_1825467.html?ir=Arts#slide=1421101
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