Monthly Archives: April 2021

Neurotech Bill Introduced in Both Senate and House of Representatives – Epilepsy Foundation

Posted: April 13, 2021 at 6:45 am

National Neurotechnology Initiative Act seeks to accelerate development of new treatments for brain and nervous system conditions

SAN FRANCISCO & WASHINGTON, D.C., March 12 - A team of prominent members of both houses of Congress introduced today the National Neurotechnology Initiative (NNTI) Act, a bill designed to foster new discoveries and accelerate the development of new and safer treatments for the one in three Americans living with a brain-related illness, injury or disease.

The sponsors of the NNTI Act, Senator Patty Murray (D-WA) and Representatives Patrick J. Kennedy (D-RI 1st) and Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-FL 18th), have called upon Congress to reverse the growing economic burden generated by brain-related illness, which exceeds $1 trillion per year in the U.S. due to healthcare costs and lost income.

"The huge numbers speak for themselves: There are 100 million Americans suffering from a brain-related illness, with an enormous economic burden that continues to grow as the population ages," said Zack Lynch, Executive Director of the Neurotechnology Industry Organization. "For a modest investment, Congress has the opportunity to streamline research efforts, accelerate the development of new treatments, promote innovation and job creation by small businesses and have a meaningful impact on the lives of those suffering from devastating diseases and injuries."

Designed to increase private investment and accelerate the development of treatments reaching the market, the NNTI employs targeted increases in funding to improve Federal research coordination and ease bottlenecks that inhibit the development of treatments for brain-related illnesses. The bill accomplishes these goals with less than 4 percent of the total Federal neuroscience research budget - $200 million - and reflects a more balanced disease-cost to research-dollars-expended ratio.

"While our ability to understand how the brain works grows each day, our ability to understand and repair brain illnesses remains limited," said Senator Murray. "For the millions of Americans that suffer from a brain related illness, and the thousands of Americans coming home from Iraq and Afghanistan with Traumatic Brain Injury and PTSD, a new federal commitment to research and treatment can't wait. This bill will place a premium on sharing the information researchers gain everyday and will support ongoing but underfunded programs at NIH."

"With so many Americans suffering from brain-related illnesses, it is crucial for us as a society to maximize our efforts and continue learning about the many facets of the brain, leading to a healthier life for all Americans," said Congressman Patrick Kennedy.

"This legislation will turn America into a nation where brain injuries and diseases are tackled through innovative technology, state of the art medical equipment and top notch neuroscientists. Together we can make this a reality," said Congresswoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen.

The National Neurotechnology Initiative is designed to address four key bottlenecks that slow the process of developing brain treatments:

The bill also creates a research center that will focus on the ethical, legal, and social implications of neurotechnology.

Have an idea that this legislation will support? Get ideas on how to launch it in our Innovation Center.

Follow this legislation: Senate Bill 586 and House Bill 1483

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Neurotech Bill Introduced in Both Senate and House of Representatives - Epilepsy Foundation

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Asia Pacific Rayon Raises US$300m from National and International Affiliated Banks to Expand Production Capacity – Taiwan News

Posted: at 6:44 am

JAKARTA, INDONESIA - Media OutReach - 12 April 2021 - Asia Pacific Rayon (APR), the largest integrated rayon fiber producer in Indonesia, today announced that it has secured a syndicated loan facility of Rp 4.5 trillion (US$300 million) with national and international affiliated banks. The funding will be used to support continued capital investment in the company's production facilities at Pangkalan Kerinci, Riau Province, Sumatra.

APR is vertically integrated through its supply chain, from renewable fiber plantations to high-value textile development. It commenced operations in 2019 and was formally inaugurated by President Jokowi Widodo in February 2020. APR plans to increase its production capacity over the coming year to capture the strong growth potential of viscose staple fiber (VSF), strengthening its market position in Indonesia and in export markets across the region. APR is a member of the RGE group of companies. Founded by Sukanto Tanoto, RGE manages a group of resource-based manufacturing companies with global operations.

The syndicated loan participating banks are PT Bank Rakyat Indonesia (Persero) Tbk, PT Bank Central Asia Tbk, PT Bank Pan Indonesia Tbk, PT Bank Pembangunan Daerah Jawa Barat, PT Bank Woori Saudara Indonesia 1906 Tbk and PT Bank KEB Hana Indonesia

The joint mandated lead arrangers and bookrunners for the syndicated loan are PT Bank Rakyat Indonesia (Persero) Tbk, PT Bank Central Asia Tbk, and PT BANK Pan Indonesia Tbk.

Basrie Kamba, Director, Asia Pacific Rayon, said: "This funding will be used to support continued investment in our operations in Kerinci. Rayon fiber, or viscose, is a textile raw material derived from sustainably managed plantations. As rayon is both renewable and biodegradable, it supports the trend towards sustainable fashion in Indonesia and in other markets around the world."

APR's planned expansion is aligned with the Indonesian Government's strategy to increase investment and boost employment to support the recovery of the country's economy and address the continued impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. Following the passing into law of the Omnibus Bill in October last year to streamline investment and stimulate job creation, President Widodo said last month that investment would be the key factor in achieving 5% economic growth in 2021.

"This loan facility and our continued investment in our operations are evidence of the growth potential of the viscose rayon sector in Indonesia and around the world. We are committed to supporting the Indonesian Government's efforts to improve the investment climate in export-oriented manufacturing industries, and its efforts to create upstream jobs in plantations and the processing of raw materials, and downstream opportunities in textile factories and related businesses," said Basrie.

Hari Setiawan, Executive Vice President of PT Bank Rakyat Indonesia (Persero) Tbk said : "As Representative of JMLAB and all lenders, I hope this collaboration will be useful to support the growth and development of PT Asia Pacific Rayon in increasing production and operations and also supporting the recovery of Indonesia's export growth."

"Support from BCA and other Banks reflect our confidence in APR, and as our contribution to promote a sustainable and environment friendly industry. We hope this cooperation will tighten our relationship as well," said Susiana Santoso, Executive Vice President of PT Bank Central Asia Tbk.

Asia Pacific Rayon is the first fully integrated viscose rayon producer in Asia. Located in Pangkalan Kerinci, Riau, the company uses the latest production technology to produce high-quality rayon to meet textile needs. APR is committed to becoming a leading viscose rayon producer with the principles of sustainability, transparency and operational efficiency, serves the interests of the community and the country, and provides value to customers. APR is part of the RGE (Royal Golden Eagle) group of resource-based manufacturing companies. Sustainability is fundamental to APR. The APR Sustainability Policy, updated in September 2020, include additional commitments on pulp sourcing and clean manufacturing.

RGE Pte Ltd manages a group of resource-based manufacturing companies with global operations. Our work ranges from the upstream, comprising sustainable resource development and harvesting, to downstream, where our companies create diverse value-added products for the global market. Our commitment to sustainable development underpins our operations, as we strive towards what is good for the community, good for the country, good for climate, good for customer, and good for company. RGE was founded in 1973. The assets held by RGE companies today exceed US$20 billion. With more than 60,000 employees, we have operations in Indonesia, China, Brazil, Spain and Canada and continue to expand to engage newer markets and communities. http://www.rgei.com

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The carbon crisis: Four big questions for the packaging industry – Packaging Europe

Posted: at 6:44 am

What practical steps is the industry taking and what solutions are on the horizon to tackle the monumental challenge of carbon reduction? Victoria Hattersley spoke to experts from the Carbon Trust, Amcor, Mondi, Smurfit Kappa and Tetra Pak to get their views on some of the big questions around this issue.

Reducing carbon emissions to avert climate catastrophe is the true existential challenge of our times far more than Covid or anything else we can conceivably think of. And while the pandemic might have given us some temporary breathing space over the past year as emissions, according to the Global Carbon Budget Report, took a 7% drop, its almost certain we will be back on the same destructive path as soon as life returns to what we might blithely consider normal.

We know all this, and at Packaging Europe we report daily on the steps various members of the value chain are taking to grapple with this task. Some are making real progress, while others readily use terms like circular economy and decarbonization but have yet to make the kind of substantive changes the situation requires.

None of the people I have spoken to for this piece claim to have all the answers but were happy to share their thoughts on what concrete action might look like. The first question they addressed and its one we will all by now be familiar with was:

1. Do we need to put the focus on carbon over plastic waste?

The plastics backlash is perhaps an overused term but its certainly had major reverberations across the industry in recent years. So much so that some would say the focus on the undeniably dire issue of plastic waste has drawn attention away from the wider overall climate crisis. Is this a fair representation?

In part, it may come down to a simple case of what the eye can see. Obviously the plastic waste is more visible so I think that, even in the perception of government and media sometimes it is put in the same bucket as climate change when really they are very different, says Gerald Rebitzer, Director of Sustainability at Amcor Flexibles. Both are very important so Im not saying we should think of it as one vs. the other, but my personal view is that the climate crisis is the important issue for humanity.

But for others, they are really two parts of the same thing and cannot be treated separately. Tackling plastic waste and addressing the climate crisis are both important and often go hand-in-hand, says Laura Timlin, Director, Business Services at the Carbon Trust. We know that we need to move away from using fossil fuels in order to help global economies to fully decarbonize should virgin plastic derived from fossil fuels continue to be used at the current rate, it will comprise 17% of global emissions by 2050. So, reducing reliance on virgin plastic will be crucial to tackling the climate crisis at the same time as addressing the damaging environmental impact of plastic waste.

Most likely, the solution lies somewhere in-between. We cannot put all our energies into reducing plastic waste when the plastics industry is not even the biggest producer of carbon emissions: but more efficient use of the plastics we do create and perhaps a greater focus on non-fossil-based materials could make a real difference. Which leads us on to our next question.

2. What decarbonization routes should the industry focus on?

The above is all well and good: but if this justified urgency is not backed up by concrete action on a systemic scale then well all be left floundering. The people I spoke to have some areas of agreement and some differing views on where the industry should be directing its efforts. What does seem to a source of agreement is that all stakeholders in the packaging sector need to broaden their perspective.

The increased use of recycled content for plastic production is one strand: the world as a whole needs to come to treat plastic as the precious commodity it is. Only then can it be part of the solution, rather than contributing to the problem.

Utilizing recycled content is very important in a low carbon economy, says Laura Timlin. Carbon emissions continue to come from plastic packaging after its disposal with the amount of emissions dependent on the manner of its disposal. Most plastic packaging has low value and is not recycled but rather incinerated, which not only generates emissions but also wastes resources. Part of this comes down to an increased focus on design for recyclability and resource efficiency, using materials that are part of mainstream recycled pathways.

While increased recycling and improving the entire infrastructure for this could certainly reduce the overall carbon footprint of fossil-based plastics, we should also consider the role played by the feedstocks themselves.

Some put it more emphatically: While circular economy policy measures on recycling are essential, we need an environmental approach that includes the decarbonisation of materials and manufacturing, to reduce the impact on our planet.One approach is plant-based, says Gilles Tisserand, Head of Sustainability Transformation, Tetra Pak Europe & Central Asia. Plant-based materials are renewable and better for the environment. Renewable resources can be replenished over time and enable a move away from fossil fuel-based products, with a lower carbon footprint and reduced environmental impact. Bioplastics developed from sugarcane are an exciting area and we are continuing to innovate with sugarcane-derived polymers. Already, weve launched our Tetra Rex Plant-based carton, the worlds first and only fully renewable beverage carton.

And what about reusables? In recent years a considerable amount of momentum seemed to be building around reusable packaging models but this has slowed a little in part, but not wholly, because of the safety concerns around Covid-19. So how can the industry get reuse back on track, enabling it to play its part in the carbon solution?

A lot more needs to be done to push this agenda, says Laura Timlin. A re-use model provides a compelling way to reduce climate impacts by avoiding emissions associated with single-use packaging. Many brands will need to completely rethink their business model. Not only does a re-use model need to be easy for a consumer but it also needs to help a brand maintain its market value, credibility and competitiveness.

However, Gerald Rebitzer sounds a note of caution here, reiterating the importance of LCA: Carbon emissions for reuse models need to be considered so one should only make that change if it leads to lower carbon emissions; for example, if reusable bottles are being shipped a long way that somewhat negates the environmental benefits.

The above are by no means the only routes to carbon reduction, but its a fair overview of the directions in which the sustainability conversation is moving.

3. Should we be materials-agnostic?

Another big question with no simple answer: what of the packaging materials themselves and their respective carbon footprints? Do we favour plastics? Paper? Infinitely recyclable materials such as metal and glass? The crux of this issue is that its very hard to quantify the individual carbon impact of any material. By what metric do we measure? The initial production of the material? Distance travelled? Weight? End of life? So many questions and there are many, many more.

With plastic, for example, its protective properties are undeniable and carbon impact of production is comparatively low, so the issue here is that we are still, globally, falling short when it comes to the appropriate collection, sorting and recycling infrastructure.

According to Gerald Rebitzer, while Amcor uses plastics, aluminium and paper, from a carbon perspective, for most applications plastics and specifically flexibles are kind of unbeatable. But we need to solve the recyclability question otherwise there will be policies that ban certain plastics and then you go back to metal cans or glass which have a very bad LCA performance compared to plastics even if they are recycled.

What about the perspective from the paper industry? How does it counter the argument that paper is far more energy-intensive than plastic to produce and that, furthermore, that the paper industry is currently under less pressure from governments to tackle its emissions?

It is not a simple matter of evaluating a carbon footprint in isolation, says Susan Brunner, Senior Sustainability Positioning Manager, Mondi Group. We also have to consider the energy fuel mix (for paper its mainly biomass-based), in particular whether the energy is derived from renewable materials. According to Cepi, the paper industry has lowered its carbon emissions by 27% since 2005 and is the largest industrial generator and user of renewable energy in Europe.

And other paper producers believe perhaps unsurprisingly that we should be moving away from plastics altogether. Plastic is a fossil-based product and for the moment not easily recycled, says Steven Stoffer, Group VP of Sustainable Development at Smurfit Kappa. Even when it is recycled, it will most likely eventually be used as fossil-based fuel for heat generation. From that perspective, it has a delayed use as fossil fuel. Paper will never have that issue.

Or maybe, in some cases, there should be no packaging at all? The important thing with packaging is to avoid knee-jerk reactions by substituting with alternate materials that do not perform as well, says Laura Timlin. The lowest emission scenario is to eliminate all packaging where it is not required, i.e. online grocery retailers now offer a no bags option which enables the customer to unpack straight from the delivery crate.

How do we unpick all these varying and sometimes quite opposite opinions? Is an agnostic approach the best one: in short, yes, if you consider it to be a case of choosing the right material for each application (oft-used phrases such as plastics where possible, paper where necessary come to mind here). There is no sense in demonizing any one material: it comes down to that delicate balancing act of accounting for all the many metrics that make up the life cycle of a package.

4. What are the most promising emerging solutions or technologies?

The above has been focused mainly on todays market realities but technology is evolving all the time. Are there any game-changing solutions emerging with the potential to make a real difference to the packaging sectors carbon footprint?

For Gerald Rebitzer, there is not one single tech, or even a handful of technologies it comes down to systemic change increasing use of renewable energy everywhere, increasing recyclability: if we really get to the point where a large proportion of plastics are recycled and stay in the loop then the losses are filled with polymers from renewable sources. Then you have the most perfect system available as you keep the polymers in the loop wherever possible and you can plug the gaps with renewables. That would actually disconnect the plastics from the fossil fuel usage and related impact.

Chemical recycling, of course, is always hovering tantalizingly on the horizon, and most would agree there are huge opportunities for circularity here if or when the technology becomes widely available and economically viable. But there is still work to be done around the economics of this, and also the energy consumption required for the process.

As an interesting side note, Gerald Rebitzer gives us an illustration of how focusing on emissions reduction in one industry can have a trickle-down effect on sustainable development in other sectors.

At the moment a lot of the raw materials for polymers are a by-product of fuel production for the automotive sector: naphtha, diesel etc. If you look at how much oil and gas goes into fuels vs. how much goes into plastics, about 90% goes into fuels. At the moment chemical recycling is competing with a by-product that is generated from fuel production. Once there is more regulatory demand for electric cars and fuel production is reduced then chemical recycling should become a lot more competitive because there would be less of these by-products available to use. It could change the dynamics of the petrochemical chain.

As to paper, Smurfit Kappas Steven Stoffer tells us how new fuels, such as hydrogen, may help to make the industry more energy efficient. Also, there are lots of ongoing studies researching how to make paper without the use of water. If that is possible, then the energy requirements from paper reduction will be greatly reduced.

But this problem will not be solved by technology alone, cautions Laura Timlin. While new technologies can help, the real difference will be behaviour change from both organizations and consumers.

How to move forward?

To be blunt, is this behaviour change happening quickly enough?

There will hopefully always be areas of healthy disagreement, but more and more what we hear is voices calling for broad areas of consensus. It is not a case of pitting one material or one strategy against another. With carbon, there is no perfect solution, only the best that can be achieved. Of course, as individuals we can all play our part, but we are beyond relying on the example of individuals alone: the major change has to be systemic.

Some companies are doing a lot in this space but this level of effort needs to be universally applied in order to see significant change, says Laura Timlin. It is therefore really important for packaging companies to demonstrate the action they are taking by committing to, and then setting science-based targets backed by a plan on how they are transitioning to meet the requirements of a 1.5-degree pathway aligned with the Paris Agreement.

Indeed. And there has been some real progress made within the industry, while initiatives such as the European Green Deal aim to provide incentives for change, transforming the 27-country bloc into a low-carbon economy without reducing economic growth. But this is no time for hearty back-slapping and champagne all round. There needs to be greater transparency and scrutiny around decarbonization: those in the industry that are doing their part will welcome that; others will need to rethink.

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An Interview With the Man Who Keeps Uploading My Feet to WikiFeet – The Cut

Posted: at 6:43 am

Photo-Illustration: by The Cut; Photos: Getty Images

Back in the fall, I received an unexpected text from a man I had just started seeing. Are u on wikifeet?

Assuming he was joking, I laughed and said no. Then he sent me a link to my wikiFeet page. I had never actually heard of the website basically an encyclopedia of celebrity foot photos for fetishists and foot enthusiasts until that moment.

To be clear, I am not a celebrity. I have decent Twitter following from having reported on politics for over a decade, from tweeting jokes about politics and appearing on cable news sometimes. But I was pretty shocked to be looking at my own wikiFeet profile, which included my full name, birthday, and photos of me and my exposed feet, dating back to a family vacation in 2013. The images seemed to have been lifted from my Instagram page, which I keep public because I share my work and media appearances there sometimes. My feet had a very sad 3.5 out of 5 stars rating, which categorized them as okay.

The discovery was surreal; I wasnt offended or unnerved, though I can understand why someone would be. I mostly thought it was funny, and posted a video of me wiggling my painted toes in a flattering filter to my story for my fans, as a joke. Within minutes, a screenshot of it showed up on wikiFeet.

At this point, my investigative journalist instincts kicked in. I figured I could triangulate the persons identity by refreshing wikiFeet over and over after posting a barefoot photo, and then checking my list of story viewers as soon as it showed up. This narrowed the list of suspects down significantly, but not quite enough to be conclusive. I decided to try a direct approach: I posted a story that said, If you are the person posting my foot content please DM me! No shade, I just have questions.

I assumed no one would come forward so much so that I forgot to even check my DMs from people I dont follow until months later. It wasnt until last week that I noticed, to my surprise, the man had reached out. His name is Robert Hamilton, a 58-year-old salesman from northern New Jersey. Okay, he wrote. What questions do you have? I admit I posted, if it bothers you I apologise and will not do it again.

Robert agreed to go on the record and was helpful and responsive as I tried to set up an interview. I was only reminded of the nature of our relationship at one point when he asked, right after saying he was available to chat Thursday, whether my feet are ticklish. (I dodged the question.)

I called him on Thursday afternoon, while he was in the middle of watching a Yankees game. Hes gregarious and has a thick Jersey accent. We spoke for nearly an hour, almost entirely about feet.

Robert! Is it just Robert, or do you go by something else? You sound young.Yeah, just Robert. And Im almost 60 years old, young lady.

Do you consider yourself a foot fetishist?Yes.

Since when?Age 6.

Thats very specific. What happened when you were 6?A couple things have happened, but well start there. I have five sisters well I had five, two of them passed away. But a lot of their friends would come around, and we had a pool in the backyard, and theyd be barefoot. You know, theyd be here while my sisters werent here, theyd just come over and use the pool, and I would give them foot massages.

What was the other thing?When I was about 9, these new people moved on my block, right? They were older girls. And they had their own pool across the street. We were playing this game, and they were like, Well, we have to tie you up, because we captured you, you know? Youre the bad guy. They tied me to a lawn chair, with my hands over my head and my feet tied down. And they started tickling my feet, and it just drove me crazy.

I think thats what made me realize theres nothing wrong with it. Its fun. I just didnt feel like it was weird or anything. So Im thinking to myself, Hey, what is the problem with this? This is who I am. Im not hurting anybody, Im not robbing banks. Just let it ride. Thats when I decided, Who gives a shit?

How do you interact with wikiFeet? How much time a day do you spend on it?Well, for example, if Im watching a movie with a beautiful actress that I like, Ill go on there and check out her feet. Or if Im reading a story about someone like you who I think is very pretty, Im gonna go check and see if shes on there. Because Im curious, and I love feet.

How many photos have you posted there?A couple hundred.

How did you first discover my feet? I cant remember how I first discovered you. But I looked on Instagram and saw you on there and you had a lot of barefoot pictures, and I just followed you, that was all. I also like your dog. I like Pedro, hes cool. Your feet are quite beautiful, by the way.

Thanks. What makes a foot attractive to you?I like the painted toes. I like an arch, the more pronounced the better. Im kinda weird with the toes, I like a rounded big toe. If its more square its okay, but the rounded is better. I definitely like the soles. But I like the arches, that gets you turned on.

Ive noticed that sometimes within ten minutes of me posting an Instagram story that shows my feet, the screenshot is up on wikiFeet. How does that happen? Do you spend all your time on Instagram waiting for new foot content to drop?I dont sit here looking for it. If I just happen to see it and I like it, Ill put it on there. But Im not sitting here all day staring or anything. That doesnt pay the bills.

So why not just look at feet on Instagram, or screenshot them for yourself? What do you get out of posting them to another website?You know, thats a great question. I dont really get anything out of it. I just like to share it. I mean, people like feet, like me, and you have beautiful feet, and I just put it on there. I just think Im helping other people out. I mean, I do save some for myself.

There isnt much of a community on wikiFeet. Its not like people can heart the photos or whatever. Sometimes someone will send you a little note like, Thats a good picture, thanks a lot. Good job. Thats really it; you dont really connect with anybody. I just like to share the picture with other people, Im generous that way.

Like that one of you on the stoop in what was it, a flying-nun getup? And you were barefoot

I was dressed as a handmaid for Halloween. You posted that one?Yeah. Sorry. That was very sexy.

Do you ever think about how it might be a bit invasive to take someones personal photos and put them on a fetish site without their knowledge or consent? That some people might be unsettled by that?Yes, I do think that. You know, except I cant call up Jennifer Aniston and ask. But it does cross my mind, because I have five sisters and six nieces, and I guess not everybody would be kosher with it. Believe me, it crosses my mind. I do have a conscience. I think people seem to have a good sense of humor about it. I mean, you obviously do. Some celebrities say its a badge of honor.

I noticed that wikiFeet has pretty strict rules about whose feet and what kinds of photos you can post. The person has to have an IMDb page to be fair game. Do you pay attention to those rules when you want to post someone like me, who isnt as well-known?Yeah. For example, a musician from England who performed barefoot, like Ill find a picture I think is sexy, and Ill put her name in IMDb. And she didnt have a page, so I couldnt post hers. But you did.

Who elses feet besides mine do you like to post?I put up Jennifer Aniston. Kelly Ripa, though I dont really like her, but anyway Kate Beckinsale, I put her up a lot. Musicians. Sheryl Crow.

What are the best feet youve ever seen?Marilyn Monroe, Kate Beckinsale, Laura Bassett. Im ass-kissin, baby! Grace Kelly. Rita Hayworth, oh my God, I love her.

Youve posted Ritas feet?Yeah, I did. But shes gone, so I dont think she gives a shit.

Do you rate womens feet on wikiFeet?Yes.

Do you ever rate them poorly?No, you know why and this is silly, like I know these people but I dont wanna hurt their feelings. If theyre ugly, I just dont go there again.

What are your main interests besides feet and the Yankees?Live music. The last concert I went to was Little Steven and the Disciples of Soul at the Beacon Theatre, November of 2019, just before I got this damn heart surgery that almost killed me.

You almost died?Yeah, I had a quadruple bypass, and it was a heck of a lot of fun. But you know what? When I was in Florida in the hospital Ive had a couple surgeries I had the nurse coming in at night showing me her feet. I actually took her out to dinner a couple times. I can just get girls out of their shoes, its a thing I can do.

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Pixies give seal of approval to Nandi Bushells cover of Where Is My Mind – Louder

Posted: at 6:43 am

Pixies have given their seal of approval to a cover of Surfer Rosa classic Where Is My Mind recorded by musical prodigy Nandi Bushell.

Bushells epic drum battle with Foo Fighters frontman Dave Grohl was one of the more heartwarming stories to emerge during the past 12 months, and the gifted English schoolgirl has continued to entertain her 274,000 YouTube subscribers in recent months by uploading covers of classic songs by Muse, Red Hot Chili Peppers, The Who and - most recently - Pixies to her channel. And her efforts have not gone unnoticed, as, earlier today, Pixies posted Great work @Nandi_Bushell! in response to Ms Bushells solo cover of Where Is My Mind.

Check out the full version of the song below:

Pixies recently rescheduled their upcoming Dublin show at the Iveagh Gardens to July 16, 2022. The bands scheduled support to Pearl Jam at Londons Hyde Park has also been moved, and will now take place on July 8, 2022.

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4 Ways to Use Video Content on Facebook to Increase Audience and Conversion – – VENTS Magazine

Posted: at 6:43 am

A Facebook page is an extension of your businesss website. It amplifies your reach to a new audience beyond website visitors.

Compared to a website, its more effective for sharing news about your company, promoting new content, and building closer relationships with your clients/consumers.

A section on Facebook thats currently increasing in popularity is video content. The social platform encourages its users to upload video content directly to their website by improving their search algorithm for ranking native video results above other content formats (i.e., photos, status updates, etc.).

So how can you best exploit this Facebook algorithm change for your business?

One thing to keep in mind when uploading your video to Facebook is to keep it short.

Research by SocialBakers on this topic found that videos that were less than 21 seconds in length performed in the top quarter for completion rates. It makes a lot of sense, considering one-third of Facebook users use the mobile app for browsing their news feed.

Chances are, theyre not only browsing Facebook; maybe they also check Twitter, Instagram, or other social media. So they likely dont want to spend more than a minute watching a video that might not do them any good.

Thats why you need to cram as much value as possible into a short video. If you thought that wasnt possible, youre wrong. Tip Hero has a lot of short (1 minute tops) but helpful videos. And they get millions of views for each of them.

I know: Tip Hero is not an industrial corporation or a niche startup. They work in a relatively general niche, and their audience range is much more significant.

Lets say youre a niche startup with a particular market target. Itd be good to have an exciting piece of media for pitching your concept to investors and for publishing it so other investors can see what creative ideas you have.

In this case, you should create an explainer video for your business, like this one from Pinterest.

An explainer video is a short (<2 minutes, consisting of 200 words of narration or less), informative, and a commonly animated video thats generally used to describe what a product or a company does in a fun and descriptive visual.

Interesting, isnt it? An explainer video can explain an abstract concept much better with a visual presentation. These kinds of videos wouldnt be called explainers otherwise.

If you want to learn more about explainer videos and see more examples of them, heres a showcase by startups and companies from all over the world.

As a company, youve got to have a mission to aim for and a vision to guide you. Facebook is the perfect place to share your companys aim.

The reason? More and more people are turning to social media platforms to learn about brands. Half of the participants in a Lab42 survey said they find a brands Facebook page more helpful than its website.

Nike is an excellent example of a brand that uses video content to share its view with the world on Facebook. The videos they share with their audience arent about selling the productstheyre about showing the world what values they stand for.

Video content can be great for evoking emotions in an audience, so try to incorporate this into your video content on Facebook. It can be anything from making your audience laugh to making them feel angry or sad.

Research by Ehrenberg-Bass Institute for Marketing Science found that the most-shared video content on social media were pieces with the most substantial emotional impact, regardless of the emotions positivity or negativity.

Corporate videos are usually serious stuff, and people do not browse their Facebook for additions to their stress levels from their daily activities. Give your audience a break and inject elements of fun into the videos you upload to Facebook.

If you think this is cheesy, well, it is. But the point is to make your video less stressful and fun to watch because thats what gets people to watch it in its entirety.

General Electric did just that in their recent promo video for employment opportunities:

I dont recommend going with this fun type of video constantly, though, especially if youre a B2B company. B2B companies need to make the best first impression they can to show potential clients that they mean business.

Facebook is currently experimenting with new video formats. It is a good feature for businesses with Facebook pages because it provides new and exciting ways to share your videos and get involved with your audience.

Here are the kinds of videos you should try for your business:

Live video on Facebook offers a whole new level of audience interaction for your business. Its convenient for something that requires real-time interaction between you and your audiences, such as interviews and Q&A.

Facebook Live allows you to reach anyone who follows you, but with all the posts from everyone else, some of your audience might miss your live stream. However, there is an option to boost your live stream. Regular live streaming tends to increase subscribers to your pageand thus, you have a larger audience to reach.

Its more technical, and its not for everyone on Facebook. It requires more than just a smartphone with iOs or Android running to make a 360 video. But the results of a 360 video can be phenomenal.

Related to Facebooks new features, other changes alter the way businesses use video content on various social platforms.

The keys to getting the most from Facebook as a marketing funnel using video:

What do you have in mind for your next Facebook post? Leave a quick comment.

Author Bio

Andre Oentoro is the founder of Breadnbeyond, an award winning explainer video company. He helps businesses increase conversion rates, close more sales, and get positive ROI from explainer videos (in that order).

Twitter: @breadnbeyond

Email: [emailprotected]

LinkedIn: Andre Oentoro

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Material Gallery Android app to be decommissioned in favor of web app – 9to5Google

Posted: at 6:43 am

Google is set to kill decommission their Material Gallery app on Android, pushing designers to the web app.

About APK Insight: In this APK Insight post, weve decompiled the latest version of an application that Google uploaded to the Play Store. When we decompile these files (called APKs, in the case of Android apps), were able to see various lines of code within that hint at possible future features. Keep in mind that Google may or may not ever ship these features, and our interpretation of what they are may be imperfect. Well try to enable those that are closer to being finished, however, to show you how theyll look in case that they do ship. With that in mind, read on.

By Googles own description, the Material Gallery app is a collaborative tool for uploading design work, getting feedback, and tracking revisions, launched in 2018. Recently, Google changed Material Gallery from using its own infrastructure to using Google Photos, which means your uploaded creations now count against your Google accounts storage quota.

The next change that seems to be coming to Material Gallery is that Google may be shutting down at least the Android app, if not also the iOS app. The latest update version 1.4.36 rolling out now via the Google Play Store includes a few different variations on the notice explaining that Material Gallery for Android is shutting down, each with a blank where the shutdown date would go.

The Material Gallery Android app will be decommissioned on %1$s.

See our Help Center for more information.

The Material Gallery Android app will be decommissioned on %1$s.

Help Center for more information, or use Google Takeout to export your data.

In the third message, which will only be shown after the apps decommissioning deadline, its revealed that the web app for Material Gallery will continue to work as normal. This means only the mobile app will shutting down, not the service itself.

The Material Gallery Android app was decommissioned on %1$s.

See our Help Center for more information, or visit gallery.io to continue using Gallery.

The mentioned Help Center page has not yet been updated with information about the Material Gallery Android app shutting down, but with a bit of digging into the apps code weve found the date that the app will be decommissioned, July 8, 2021. However, until the above notices are live in the app and the proper support pages are in place, we cannot be fully certain that the Material Gallery mobile app is indeed shutting down or when that would happen.

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Want to Make Your Music Blow Up on TikTok? Here Are 8 Proven Tips – Digital Music News

Posted: at 6:43 am

Playlist Push cut its teeth on Spotify playlists, once the most important battleground for growing your music. But that was before TikTok exploded, and Playlist Push started diversifying accordingly to help artists grow their careers on the short-form video app. Now that TikTok looks like its here to stay in the U.S., Playlist Push joined forces with Digital Music News to distill the best pro tips for making your music blow up on this fast-growing platform. Enjoy.

Nailing the sound clip the 15-second to 60-second segment that plays when creators select a song is imperative. The majority of TikTok videos are 10-15 seconds in length (and feature 10-15 seconds of music), but distributors typically set songs sound clips as their first 15, 30, or 60 seconds by default.

This is the foremost impediment to promotional achievements on the service, as the sound clip should showcase the catchiest 15 seconds of the track at hand. The sound clips for Old Town Road, Supalonely, and Dreams, for instance, present the tracks most memorable (and TikTok-suited) elements.

You can customize your TikTok snippets through your distributor or by manually uploading a video.

For musicians, being personally active on TikTok is an important component of building meaningful relationships with users and music fans.

Regularly creating content will enable you to determine what works in videos and the types of content that users like most while bolstering your following. Plus, commenting on viral videos with your music is a quick and engaging way to attract additional followers yet.

Followers, in turn, can help you to launch campaigns and capitalize on trend-related opportunities.

Frequently enjoying other TikTok users videos, with an emphasis on learning from their technical characteristics, is also a worthwhile habit.

Then, you can effectively reverse engineer the videos and the strategies of todays leading TikTok voices.

Implementing straightforward video concepts is another key ingredient in the recipe for music-promotion success on TikTok. For obvious reasons, accessible trends reach a larger number of fans than niche concepts. Concepts that are fun and easy to replicate make it easier for your song to spread.

Sharing the best fan renditions of your top-performing TikTok videos across all of social media is a great way to amplify promotional effectiveness. Many of the resulting viewers will craft their own clips featuring your music helping to keep the trend and the fan interest going.

The holy grail is for the music to spill into streaming and into fan-base building, summed up Playlist Pushs George Goodrich when speaking to Digital Music News.

Understanding and adapting to the basics of TikToks algorithm is a must. In brief, the portion of users that watch a video from beginning to end and, better yet, multiple times is more significant than likes, comments, and shares.

Its the completion rate that TikTok analyzes when deciding whether to plug emerging clips on users For You pages. Consequently, inherently interesting content is positioned to succeed from the outset.

While marketing your music on TikTok, its important to bear in mind that there are north of 800 million users and many more videos than that on the three-year-old service.

Given this immense volume of users and content, riding trends to new career heights is in many ways a long game. Practice, including determining what works best for you and your followers, is therefore invaluable.

Lastly, running a TikTok promotional campaign via Playlist Push is an excellent way to help your music explode on the app. To date, Playlist Push has executed more than 1,000 campaigns, generating a cumulative total of well over two billion views for participating artists.

Kicking off your own far-reaching promotional effort takes just minutes and is as easy as sending Playlist Push a link to your TikTok sound (as well as your preferred hashtag) and selecting a launch date. Playlist Pushs network of more than 3,700 micro-influencers (boasting some 935 million followers) will then be enlisted to create concept-centered clips with the music.

Rather than paying for one or two overhyped creators, Playlist Push maximizes your value by engaging micro-influencers for each campaign, getting you more videos, more views, and more shots at going viral.

Playlist Push also enables creators to analyze the play counts associated with both paid TikTok videos and videos that are created organically, and this information can be used to reach fans outside of TikTok, including on streaming services.

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Five reasons to choose fiber Internet over traditional networks – WRAL Tech Wire

Posted: at 6:43 am

This article was written for our sponsor, Ting Internet.

Having a reliable and secure Internet connection is more critical now than ever. With work-from-home and remote learning, theres never been more demand on your home network. Fiber Internet gives customers speeds and dependability that standard copper connections simply cant match.

Fiber-optic Internet is a relatively new technology, and many people may not know why switching over will save you time and give you more peace of mind. Here are the top five reasons to make the switch to fiber from a traditional network so you can enjoy blazing speeds and unparalleled stability.

Standard copper networks often have massive disparities between upload and download speeds. You might have decent download speeds with brutally slow uploads, making telecommuting or uploading videos a frustrating task.

Todd Rubin, Regional Manager for fiber optic provider Ting Internet, says by bringing fiber directly to the home (FTTH), latency is greatly reduced because of faster communication with the server, also known as ping.

Latency is how fast data is transmitted, says Rubin. Its measured in milliseconds, and the average ISP has latency speeds between 30 and 50 ms. With fiber optics moving at the speed of light, latency can be significantly reduced. So if youre transmitting, uploading, and downloading your files, its going to go a lot quicker.

With Ting Internet, upload and download speeds mirror one another, reducing tasks that would take 10 to 20 minutes on a copper connection down to mere seconds. Additionally, symmetrical speeds help support the growing number of devices attached to home networks, including smart home features, without compromising your connection.

Copper networks can be thrown offline for a variety of reasons. They werent made with a forward-looking approach. In fact, the wires were initially designed for voice calls, so theres a limit to how much they can transmit.

Its not just the devices youre using at the moment, says Rubin. You also have your TV, your different smart home appliances, your security system. All of those things are working simultaneously and all need to run seamlessly without interruption or lag.

Outdated systems are also susceptible to outages from inclement weather or large temperature fluctuations and become bogged down when theres high demand. Fiber networks like Ting Internets wont go down during severe weather and can handle as many users as you can throw at it. While copper wires have limitations, the only things keeping fiber from being faster are the devices that use it.

Coaxial Internet connections can be tampered with relatively easily. With a simple splice, bad actors can gain access to copper Internet connections. A fiber network uses light to transmit data, which makes stealing much more difficult. Splicing into fiber connections is exceptionally complicated, adding an extra level of security to your network.

The true potential of fiber-optic Internet has yet to be reached. As technology evolves with routers and devices getting faster, fiber lines will meet the challenge. Data travels through the glass at lightspeed, and as increased rates become the norm, fiber lines can get even faster.

Currently, Ting Internet offers 1 Gbps (1,000 Mbps) symmetrical speeds, which is the top speed available to consumers. As technology evolves, this could be on the lower end of the speed spectrum. Fiber Internet will speed up as fast as devices allow, while copper lines will need to be updated or replaced outright to have a chance.

Because fiber Internet will meet future demands, you wont have to worry about future upgrade costs.

Fiber transmits communications with pulses of light through glass strands. Because of this, its basically the speed of light and an extremely efficient process, says Tim Herzog, Ting Internet senior manager of field operations. To this date, nobody has ever put enough through it to max its capacity. So its only limited by the electronics that provide light to the glass.

This article was written for our sponsor, Ting Internet.

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Transhumanists Aim To Replace God With Machines In Digital Immortality – The Federalist

Posted: at 6:43 am

Transhumanists have hyped the new religion of high technology for decades now. The basic idea, fairly prevalent in Silicon Valley, is that rapid advances in scientific knowledge and tech innovation will culminate in our de facto omniscience and omnipotence. Even though humanity is lost in a godless cosmos, digital devices will allow us to transcend our ape-like forms.

As Googles Ray Kurzweil famously quipped, Does God exist? I would say, Not yet.

One day soon, they promise, well use artificial intelligence to overcome the limits of our meat-based cognition. According to Yuval Noah Hararis 2015 best-seller Homo Deus, computer programmers will realize the age-old fantasies of shamans and prophets by creating a virtual version of the spiritual realm. These Davos darlings are certain God is dead, but Google still wants to patent His best ideas.

Ultimately, they hope to replicate the fabric of ourselves in cyberspace, where we can all live happily ever after that is, until the electricity goes out. A recent paper by Russian transhumanist Alexey Turchin argues this digital resurrection is not only possible but necessary to reach our full potential. We just need enough power both computational and electric to create a virtual afterlife and then keep it running.

For Turchin, the solution is to construct a Dyson Sphere around the sun a megastructure 186 million miles in diameter thats covered in solar panels to capture the dying stars rays. That way, we can run the gargantuan super-computers required to house our digital selves. Sounds easy enough, I suppose. Maybe we can fill the potholes in the road while were at it.

Joining the race to boost fashionable ideas, the once sober Popular Mechanics covered Turchins work enthusiastically:

Think about the end of your life and what might happen next. If your soul exists, you continue on after death and everything is wonderful. And if it doesnt and your fate is utter demise, well, some part of you could still continue infinitely as a digital copy. Its a win-win situation in both scenarios, Turchin says.

If these lunatics convince enough people their scheme is truly working, theyll expect the rest of us to treat these gibbering clones like real people. Even worse, given the shrill demands for religious tolerance, well have to pretend we enjoy their company.

The concept behind digital resurrection goes back to the Ship of Theseus paradox, articulated by the ancient Greeks. Imagine you have a huge wooden ship. You gradually replace the rotten boards with new wood, plank by plank. Eventually, every old part has been replaced by something new. Is it not the same ship as before, only better?

Transhumanists seek to do the same with the human personality. Every neuron will be replaced by networked processors and then some. For example, to preserve himself for future immortality, Alexey Turchin submits the details of his life to ubiquitous surveillance. In addition to keeping a trivia-packed diary, he records every conversation, videotapes his behaviors, and wears an EEG headset while making art or listening to music. He has faith that one day some godlike AI will use this tedious information to resurrect him.

You could call this self-obsessed behavior a personal quirk, but Turchin is hardly alone in this endeavor. For many, its been part of the new normal since before the New Normal.

The Scan Truck is a good illustration, both literally and allegorically. Based in Los Angeles, the company developed a mobile photogrammetry studio decked out with more than 200 digital cameras to capture the uppermost, photorealistic models. The experience is like stepping into an inside-out insect eye.

Subjects who enter The Scan Trucks portable Panopticon preferably in the buff have a million pics snapped from every possible angle. The resulting composite image is then used to create a digital double. This second self includes every scar, pore, and birthmark. The service has become enormously popular among special effects specialists in the movie industry. Its also used to create hyper-realistic avatars to inhabit a virtual environment.

Clever enough, but what about ones inner self?

In line with Turchins methodology, a digital immortality industry has emerged to monitor every aspect of your life. Their services, as advertised, will create a lasting imprint of your earthly persona for friends and family to enjoy when youre gone.

Start-ups with names like Eterni.me, Replika, DeadSocial, and Deep Nostalgia are working hard to re-create deceased loved ones from photographs, home videos, personal diaries, intimate letters, second-hand anecdotes, and of course, online tracking technology. Replika offers an AI talk therapy app that probes living subjects to get at the core of their personality. The constant refrain is that we need to break down privacy barriers and become vulnerable to digital invasion.

For a modest price, this data is correlated with the subjects physical attributes. The resulting electro-wraith can then speak to the bereaved from beyond the grave. Just open your laptop, and theres your late grandma, insisting you have another plate of chicken casserole.

What about grandmas subjective soul, though that mysterious entity who watched you grow up from behind her smiling eyes?

When transhumanists tackle this issue which is less often than youd think they typically deny the existence of a stable, spiritual self thats distinct from brain activity. When the body dies, that soul will disappear. Thats why creating an electronic backup is so important.

For one thing, AI augmentation will make Grandma 2.0 smarter and less whimsical. For another, some rude guest is bound to sit in her empty chair if you dont replace her with a digital super-being.

Throughout that process, the still-embodied subject is scanned, probed, and reconstructed as a digital double. Making multiple copies is even better, but anything beats total oblivion. As years pass, the biological version will wither like a butterfly cocoon. The digital double will soar into the future on a cloud of 1s and 0s.

For those guided by materialist philosophies where transcendence is only available via physical means theres no better way to overcome the finality of death. Naturally, transhumanists tend to see people who believe in a spiritual existence beyond this mortal coil as quaint at best. As a quaint heathen myself, I suspect their well-heeled megalomania is far more irrational than any traditional religion.

These technocratic delusions are only a problem to the extent were forced to participate. Im content to live my life as a caveman and let others become cyborgs, so long as they keep their crossed wires to themselves. Thats not the world theyre creating, though. The insidious elements of their techno-cult from materialist self-obsession to ubiquitous surveillance have crept into our daily lives for decades now.

Consider the widespread adoption of monitored electronic communication. In olden times, the idea that our most intimate letters could be intercepted, analyzed, and added to detailed personal dossiers kept by tech executives and government agents to be used at their pleasure would be laughable. Today, its as routine as driving a few blocks to the grocery store.

In the blink of an eye, we saw the rapid migration of personal interaction to social media. Its now normal to document a childs life for public consumption by total strangers. For many, the privacy barriers have already been broken down. Weve made ourselves vulnerable. The craziest part is that most have enjoyed it.

The next steps in this supposedly inevitable process are just over the horizon. After years of stops and starts, virtual reality will soon be as commonplace as a television set. Many youngsters already idolize virtual influencers who dance across their touchscreens. These bubblegum apparitions are elaborate, entirely fictitious pop stars made from scratch by devious programmers. Some kids have no clue theyre not real people.

For years now, men of fighting age have retreated into video games. Would-be mothers are using dating apps to run out the biological clock. Having been conditioned by porn for generations, wealthy incels are sleeping with eerily convincing silicone dolls. Super-real sexbots are just around the corner.When the snozzberries taste like snozzberries, youll know the end is nigh.

In all of this, we see an increasing detachment from the real world of visceral struggle, heartbreak, and redemption. Without these challenges, people dont develop character or deep social bonds. Anime-obsessed man-babies are a symptom of this tendency. The insane desire for digital immortality is another.

Technocracy is being normalized at an alarming pace. If a population can be convinced that kids need state-supplied hormone blockers to become self-realized, its only a matter of time before theyre ready to upload their souls to corporate data banks. In fact, just hack into their smartphone and youll see theyre already doing it.

One of the darker tenets of the techno-cult is that their innovations are necessary for survival. Anyone who chooses to reject body modification, cognitive enhancement, or mind-uploading will be like job applicants who come to an interview with no smartphone or social media account. Theyll get left in the dust.

In a competitive technocracy, organic humans are doomed to extinction. Trendy cyborgs will transition to digital immortality, while the rest of us become fossils. To the extent that Big Tech holds sway over our lives, its a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Yet the transhumanists have it backward at least in the long run. The Egyptians were convinced they would reign forever, as were the Romans. Ultimately, however, their arrogance proved futile. The same will be said of Silicon Valley oligarchs and their consumerist disciples. One day, immortal digital souls will be displayed in museums like crumbling marble statues.

Until then, wed be wise to build high fences as nature takes its course. Were still free to choose our own paths. This is a spiritual conflict on their terms, but Im keeping faith that anything is possible.

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