Category Archives: Immortality

HereAfter AI

James Vlahos lost his father to cancer in 2017, but still chats with him all the time. John tells his son stories about his childhood crush on the girl across the street and about Papa Demoskopoulos, the pet rabbit he had as a kid. He tells him about singing in Gilbert and Sullivan operas and becoming a lawyer. Sometimes he'll drop one of his signature insults: "Well, hot dribbling spit."

The elder Vlahos talks with his child via a conversational chatbot called Dadbothis son created after his father was diagnosed with stage 4 lung cancer. For months, Vlahos recorded his dying dad's life stories, then turned them into an interactive AI that speaks in his father's voice.

James Vlahos, founder of HereAfter AI

Dadbot "was a transformational experience for me because it gave me great solace. It gave my family great solace," says Vlahos, a former tech journalist and author of Talk To Me, a book on conversational AI. "It didn't replace my dad, but it gave us this really rich way to remember him."

Now Vlahos is bringing his Dadbot technology to HereAfter AI. The platform lets the dead live on as what Vlahos calls a "Life Story Avatar" that chats on demand, in the recorded voice of the deceased. Surviving loved ones interact with the customized voice avatar via smart speaker, mobile or desktop app, and it responds, through Alexa-like voice recognition technology, with prerecorded stories, memories, jokes, songs and even advice. HereAfter AI is one of a number of startups promising digital immortality through chatbots, AI and even holograms likethese out of USC that let Holocaust survivors' stories live on. A project out of Japan envisions robots that look and act like the dead.

If your mind just jumped straight to the Black Mirror episode Be Right Back, I'm there with you -- it's the first thing I thought of when I heard of HereAfter AI. In that episode of the British dystopian anthology series, a grieving young woman signs up for a service that creates an AI version of her dead boyfriend by aggregating his social media posts and other online communication. She interacts with the digital doppelganger over instant messages and the phone before upgrading her subscription to a physical android lookalike of her guy. That's when things get complex. And arguably creepy.

Some people will no doubt be uneasy with the prospect of communicating with virtual versions of their dead family and friends. I expected to be at least a little weirded out watching a demo of HereAfter AI, but it felt heartwarming rather than chilling, kind of like chatting with Siri, if Siri were a medium communicating with the other side.

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For one thing, you have to sign up to become a Life Story Avatar, and actively participate. You fire up the app, and an automated chatbot interviewer asks you questions about your life, then records the spoken replies to capture your voice and memories and relay a sense of your personality. You can also upload photos to illustrate your words.

Later, users who pay for access to your avatar can ask it questions that get answered in the recorded voice: What's your earliest memory? How did you meet mom? What's a time when you felt really proud? Recording your stories is free, but plans for sharing the avatars with family members and friends start at $49 a year (about 37, AU$68). Users also have the option to download their full audio recordings for $95, or roughly 72/$AU134.

"While HereAfter AI does store the recordings that have been made, we do not distribute or monetize them in any alternate way, such as data mining for advertising," Vlahos says.

Think of it like a life story recording app with conversation folded in, though Vlahos acknowledges that "conversation" may be stretching it.

"Conversational AI tech is in its infancy," Vlahos says, adding that he wants future versions of the automated interviewer to be better at understanding the nuances of conversation. "But it has the basic bare bones of a give and take rather than only one way."

Interacting with the dead aside, the service also offers a way to organize memories.

Watching the demo, I thought of a cassette tape my dad recorded decades ago of his mom, my grandma, talking about her childhood in Minsk, Russia. Had Grandma been around when HereAfter AI was created, the stories recorded on that battered old tape could have been neatly cataloged and easily accessed by subject matter.

I could also have easy access to recordings of my late dad's voice beyond the two birthday voicemails I've saved on my phone but haven't yet had the strength of heart to listen to more than three years after his death. I suspect there will come a time when hearing Dad's warm throaty laugh again will feel more soothing than sad.

"To be able to hear my dad's voice when I want to... that is comforting to me," Vlahos says. "It makes him more present to me than he otherwise would be."

James Vlahos and his dad, John, who died of cancer in 2017 but still shares his life stories via a conversational chatbot.

Amanda Lambros, a grief recovery specialist in Australia who's not affiliated with HereAfter AI, calls the service a "great initiative, something that people can reach out to while grieving and beyond."

One drawback, Ambros adds, might be discovering information that wasn't communicated while the person was alive, which could lead to confusion and resentment.

At the time of this writing, HereAfter AI has several hundred users, according to Vlahos. One of them, Smita Shah, signed up for the service to preserve the many colorful stories she's heard from her dad, 92, and her mom, 86. Shah is already tapping HereAfter AI to "chat" with her parents when they're not available to talk in real time.

"They live in India and I am in Canada, so with the time difference I can still talk to them anytime and hope the next generation will remember their humble roots," Shah said.

HereAfter AI doesn't promise to mitigate grief or replace loved ones who are gone. But it can, Vlaho says, connect the dead both to those who miss them, and to those who've never met them.

"One of the fears of death is that the person slips away, that the memories slip away, that it all becomes faded and sepia-toned and vague," Vlahis says. "This type of legacy AI technology doesn't ease the sting of death, but what it does do is provide this much more rich, vivid and interactive way to remember."

See the article here:

Talk with your dead loved ones -- through a chatbot - CNET

OPINION: I will not live forever. I feel both disappointed and liberated by this. Immortality sounds great, but a life with infinite duration would lack the urgency that death provides.

Some of us will live longer than others. Our gender, race, height and amount of processed cheese we consume are all factors that, statistically, contribute to the duration of our allotted years.

And I do love processed cheese. It is a key ingredient of many of my favourite foods, as well as an excellent source of coronary heart disease. It is also, wait for it, addictive.

Cheese contains a protein called casein, released by lactating mammals to reward infants for suckling. It sails past the blood-brain barrier and gives us a lovely little hit.

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Cheese is a comfort food, and now you know why. Which is probably not information you desired but does explain why cheddar disappears from a platter faster than the celery sticks.

This also helps explain why a third of all deaths in this country are caused by cardiovascular disease.

By comparison, smoking is benign, carting off a mere 5000 of us each year, directly or indirectly.

I dont mean to lay the blame entirely at the mouldy feet of cheese. We are surrounded by a surfeit of dietary fats. Temptation is everywhere, from the golden arches to overcooked petrol station sausage rolls.

Nathan Dumlao/Unsplash

It's not just cheese we are surrounded by a surfeit of dietary fats. Temptation is everywhere.

We understand that the cost of every hamburger is more than the few dollars we surrender to acquire one.

And as adults, we expect to be able to decide for ourselves what level of risks we are willing to assume for the reward indulgence brings. This applies to almost all human endeavour, from a casual hookup to riding a motorcycle.

However, we live in an increasing infantile age. The assumption that we possess the competence to decide for ourselves what level of risk is appropriate has long been abandoned, not just by those who govern us, but by many subjects.

Restrictions on our ability to enjoy cigarettes are an excellent example.

Robert Charles/Stuff

From 2022 it will be illegal to sell cigarettes to anyone born after a certain date.

Dr Ayesha Verrall, the associate minister of health, outlined last week the states new sledgehammer against smokers.

If this plan proceeds, from 2022 it will be illegal to sell cigarettes to anyone born after a certain date, assumed to be 2008. Forever.

So, if you were born in 2010, you will be denied the illicit rite of passage involved in coughing your way through that first packet of Benson & Hedges.

Curiously, the minister attempts to justify this draconian strategy by reference to the Treaty. According to the ministry, the right to be smokefree is entrenched in Te Tiriti o Waitangi.

To bolster this assertion, the ministry points to the protection of taonga in the second article and makes the claim that wellbeing is a treasure as envisioned by those who signed the 1840 document.

Maybe. Seems we are asking the word taonga to cover a lot of ground here. An alternative interpretation could be that the guarantee of self-determination, tino rangatiratanga, applies to individuals as much as the collective.

Article 2 makes specific reference to the right of individuals to their exclusive and undisturbed possession of their Lands and Estates Forests Fisheries and other properties. If we define properties as liberally as the state does taonga, you can reverse the analysis.

This administration is trivialising the significance of the Treaty in our constitutional arrangements by invoking it to secure legitimacy for a contentious objective.

123rf

Smoking, like cheese consumption, is a personal choice. It comes with costs but also rewards.

At the centre of the policy document, however, is ideology: This action plan acknowledges that smoking is not an individual issue. Smoking is a community issue and a social issue.

Respectfully, I disagree. Smoking, like cheese consumption, is a personal choice. It comes with costs, but it also comes with rewards. The mistake the puritans driving this agenda make is their failure to comprehend that inhaling nicotine provides pleasure.

Yes, it is risky, but the existence of risk isnt a justification in itself to exercise the states power of coercion.

Smoking is prevalent amongst those who face the greatest challenges. For some, the solace that tobacco delivers may be a source of comfort in their lives. For myself, during periods of exceptional stress, smoking has been a means of self-medication.

The state has not undertaken the benefit side of the cost-benefit equation. There has also been no work done on the costs of forcing a popular and widely consumed drug underground.

Ricky Wilson/Stuff

For many, the solace that tobacco delivers may be one of the few sources of comfort in their lives.

Making cigarettes illegal will not stop their distribution nor their accessibility, only the means by which they are distributed and who will profit from this activity. The new laws will need to be enforced with fines, sanctions and, for the unrepentant, prison.

You dont need a working group to comprehend that those who will be induced to respond to this market opportunity will be those already on the margins of society and, inevitably, some of them will find themselves locked inside a cage. Prohibition always harms the poor.

After the narrow defeat of the cannabis referendum, the prime minister said: I share the view of many that the idea of individuals being criminalised for possession is not something I think most New Zealanders support.

Incredibly, this administration is aware that laws banning cannabis are harmful whilst moving to institute similar laws against tobacco.

We now have a messianic regime that appears to believe they have been anointed by destiny to save Aotearoa from Covid, guns and hate speech. Why should they not also save the unfortunate, ill-informed and ignorant from the perils of tobacco?

The right of agency, to choose, the taonga of self-determination, meanwhile, is to be restricted to those best able to exercise it: the joint smokers and gouda connoisseurs of Thorndon and Herne Bay.

Damien Grant is a business owner based in Auckland. He writes from a libertarian perspective and is a member of the Taxpayers Union but not of any political party.

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No smoking, but the Government trusts us with cheese? - Stuff.co.nz

To really get a good look at the stars, many of us have to get out of the city or the suburbs and head for darker landscapes: farmland, desert, mountaintop, national park. NASA goes that one better -- it sends telescopes out beyond the atmosphere. In space, no one's going to flip on the halogen high beams.

For years, the premier space telescope has been the Hubble. It's aging out, though, and NASA now has a newer and better alternative: the James Webb Space Telescope. If all goes well, a rocket carrying the Webb will lift off later this month, the intricately built spacecraft will open for business and soon enough we'll be treated to images and insights from the farthest reaches of the universe. Prepare for your mind to be blown.

Monisha Ravisetti's explainer on the James Webb Space Telescope is among the many in-depth features and thought-provoking commentaries that appeared on CNET this week. So here you go. These are the stories you don't want to miss.

Everything you need to know about Hubble's super-powered successor: the James Webb Space Telescope.

Part game system and part video chat, the Glow is a charming way for kids and grandparents to connect across long distances.

Commentary: Here are a few ways Apple could make a notchless iPhone.

HereAfter AI promises digital immortality through a chatbot, and it's not that weird.

Curious about crypto? Here's everything you need to know.

Mining-focused games are being integrated into 57 schools in Australia.

"People are scared," says the science guy, who's teaching a new MasterClass. "And that's where knowledge is of great value -- that's how you can overcome fear."

"Fat finger" errors have existed in traditional finance for decades. Now they're increasingly happening in NFT markets too.

Destin Daniel Cretton hopes the movie can build bridges amid a rise in anti-AAPI hate.

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9 great reads from CNET this week: James Webb telescope, Amazon Glow, iPhone notch and more - CNET

The child is father of the man;And I could wish my days to be Bound each to each by natural piety. (Wordsworth, "My Heart Leaps Up")

There was a time when meadow, grove, and stream,

The earth, and every common sight,

To me did seem

Apparelled in celestial light,

The glory and the freshness of a dream.

It is not now as it hath been of yore;

Turn wheresoe'er I may,

By night or day.

The things which I have seen I now can see no more.

The Rainbow comes and goes,

And lovely is the Rose,

The Moon doth with delight

Look round her when the heavens are bare,

Waters on a starry night

Are beautiful and fair;

The sunshine is a glorious birth;

But yet I know, where'er I go,

That there hath past away a glory from the earth.

Now, while the birds thus sing a joyous song,

And while the young lambs bound

As to the tabor's sound,

To me alone there came a thought of grief:

A timely utterance gave that thought relief,

And I again am strong:

The cataracts blow their trumpets from the steep;

No more shall grief of mine the season wrong;

I hear the Echoes through the mountains throng,

The Winds come to me from the fields of sleep,

And all the earth is gay;

Land and sea

Give themselves up to jollity,

And with the heart of May

Doth every Beast keep holiday;

Thou Child of Joy,

Shout round me, let me hear thy shouts, thou happy Shepherd-boy.

Ye blessd creatures, I have heard the call

Ye to each other make; I see

The heavens laugh with you in your jubilee;

My heart is at your festival,

My head hath its coronal,

The fulness of your bliss, I feelI feel it all.

Oh evil day! if I were sullen

While Earth herself is adorning,

This sweet May-morning,

And the Children are culling

On every side,

In a thousand valleys far and wide,

Fresh flowers; while the sun shines warm,

And the Babe leaps up on his Mother's arm:

I hear, I hear, with joy I hear!

But there's a Tree, of many, one,

A single field which I have looked upon,

Both of them speak of something that is gone;

The Pansy at my feet

Doth the same tale repeat:

Whither is fled the visionary gleam?

Where is it now, the glory and the dream?

Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting:

The Soul that rises with us, our life's Star,

Hath had elsewhere its setting,

And cometh from afar:

Not in entire forgetfulness,

And not in utter nakedness,

But trailing clouds of glory do we come

From God, who is our home:

Heaven lies about us in our infancy!

Shades of the prison-house begin to close

Upon the growing Boy,

But he beholds the light, and whence it flows,

He sees it in his joy;

The Youth, who daily farther from the east

Must travel, still is Nature's Priest,

And by the vision splendid

Is on his way attended;

At length the Man perceives it die away,

And fade into the light of common day.

Earth fills her lap with pleasures of her own;

Yearnings she hath in her own natural kind,

And, even with something of a Mother's mind,

And no unworthy aim,

The homely Nurse doth all she can

To make her Foster-child, her Inmate Man,

Forget the glories he hath known,

And that imperial palace whence he came.

Behold the Child among his new-born blisses,

A six years' Darling of a pigmy size!

See, where 'mid work of his own hand he lies,

Fretted by sallies of his mother's kisses,

With light upon him from his father's eyes!

See, at his feet, some little plan or chart,

Some fragment from his dream of human life,

Shaped by himself with newly-learn{e}d art

A wedding or a festival,

A mourning or a funeral;

And this hath now his heart,

And unto this he frames his song:

Then will he fit his tongue

To dialogues of business, love, or strife;

Read more from the original source:

Ode: Intimations of Immortality from | Poetry Foundation

Lewis Hamilton said he felt relaxed and ready on Friday night as he stood on the brink of sporting immortality. The seven-time world champion, who enters the final weekend of one of the most thrilling seasons in Formula 1 history level on points with Red Bulls Max Verstappen, topped the timesheets in practice at Abu Dhabis Yas Marina circuit as he closes in on what would be a record eighth world title.

Hamilton finished six-tenths clear of Verstappen in second practice, and afterwards said he was feeling "great" in body and mind. "I feel good. I feel good," he said. "I feel great in my body, and I think we made some positive steps set-up wise, so well try and perfect it tonight and come back hard tomorrow."

An eighth world title, 13 years after his first for McLaren as a 23-year-old back in 2008, would seal the 36-year-olds place as the most successful driver of all time, eclipsing Michael Schumacher who won seven world titles between 1994 and 2005.

It would also, surely, seal Hamiltons place in the hearts and minds of a British public which has been unfathomably slow to embrace him.

That reticence has partly been due to a lack of opposition, which has made some of Hamiltons titles feel processional. There has been nothing processional about this season.

A season which has fluctuated wildly, with both contenders leading at different points, has seen Mercedes and Red Bull clash repeatedly on and off the track.

Toto Wolff and Christian Horner, the respective team principals, put their differences momentarily aside in Friday's final press conference before this afternoons crucial qualifying session, shaking hands and wishing the other luck.

Even then, the simmering tensions were only just beneath the surface with Horner repeating his claim that Verstappen has been unfairly treated by stewards and by the media.

"I think that allegations about his driving, about his driving style, about his driving standards have been theres been a narrative thats been pushed to put pressure on him," Horner said. "I think that hes driven fantastically well all year. Max drives in a manner that ignites passion, it has brought fans into the sport, its brought new fans into the sport this year and we do not want him to change."

Race director Michael Masi has explicitly warned both Hamilton and Verstappen that they risk points deductions should they exceed the bounds of sportsmanship this weekend and cause a collision that wins them the title.

With Verstappen knowing he will be crowned champion should neither driver reach the finish on Sunday, and with the Dutch driver now seemingly occupying the slower car, there has been speculation that he might employ dirty tactics to prevail as Schumacher was accused of doing in 1994, when he took out British driver Damon Hill on the final day, and in 1997, when he failed with an attempted swipe on Jacques Villeneuve. Verstappen was last week handed 15 seconds of time penalties and twice ordered to give back positions.

Horner said the warning was unnecessary, and that all Red Bull wanted from the stewards was "consistency" in the application of the rules, adding that race-ending collisions happened at Silverstone and Hungary without seeing points penalties.

"We want to see these two titans of drivers, who have gone wheel-to-wheel so often this year go at it again this weekend, thats what, as a team we want, as a driver Max wants," Horner said.

"There needs to be consistency and so I can see why Toto and Lewis, with the disadvantage of race wins, would be pushing for that but nobodys going into this race to say its going to end in a crash. Theres been great speculation about it but our focus is on trying to win this on track and do it at the chequered flag."

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Lewis Hamilton on the verge of sporting immortality - and a place in the nation's hearts - Telegraph.co.uk

On the night of Thursday 3 September 1998, a middle-aged community college professor with a history of heart attacks passed out at the wheel of his car on a busy US highway. The car drifted across the lanes and into the rush of oncoming traffic. The collision was so powerful it thrust the engine of the professors car into the front seats. Miraculously, he survived, and no one else was seriously injured. He recovered from a broken ankle and wrist and left hospital. A month later, he was back there with a pain in his leg a clot that might or might not have been triggered by the accident. Next, his body swelled up to twice its size with fluid, so he looked like a balloon you could prick with a needle and burst. His wife and young children watched as his miraculous survival turned to a sudden worsening of his underlying heart disease. By April 1999 he was dead.

Just over two decades later his son, Michael Grothaus, sat at his computer watching a video of his father, healthy and wearing a yellow T-shirt, playing with a smartphone that was invented many years after his death. He was enjoying himself, recording the sun-dappled park around him. Then he turned towards the screen and smiled benignly at his son from behind his unmistakeable bushy eyebrows.

Grothaus had bought his father back to life as a deepfake. It only costs a couple of hundred dollars. There are whole communities of anonymous deepfakers you can easily reach out to in the danker strata of the internet. Usually they specialise in creating made-to-order-porn: say you want a video of yourself making love to Scarlett Johansson, or to the girl next door. All you need to do is provide a video snippet and they do the rest. To create the video of his father in the park, Grothaus sent over 60 seconds of VHS footage from the mid 1990s. Brad then broke it down into 1,800 images of his fathers face and ran those images through a program called DeepFaceLab, which grafted them on to a video of another man.

The digital resurrection of his father gave rise to contradictory feelings in Grothaus. He watched the video repeatedly relishing the reunion. Then he deleted it horrified at the rupture it had made in reality, and the consequences it implies for our sense of truth and trust.

This split reaction runs through Grothauss book on deepfakes. On the one hand they hold out the prospect of overcoming death, envisioning utopia, fulfilling sexual desire. On the other they bring the fear of utter chaos. Even a short fake video of, say, the CEO of a major company resigning, could send markets into panic for just long enough to enable the people who created it to make a killing. Deepfakes of candidates saying something untoward in the final moments of a close election could change the fate of geopolitics.

But while such scenarios are dizzying in their destructive potential, they are, for the most part, still theoretical. The actual financial scam Grothaus describes involves fraudsters who used a voice recording of a CEO to call his accountant and get him to wire them $243,00. Embarrassing but also only possible because of a pretty gullible interlocutor. The political case study he describes is of an amateur edit of a video that made it look as if Hollywood star Dwayne Johnson was humiliating Hillary Clinton in the run-up to the 2016 election. The video went viral in Magaland, but not because its authenticity was particularly persuasive. It just fitted with peoples existing biases.

Thats the thing about disinformation: its not really geared towards changing peoples minds. Its about feeding them what they want to consume anyway. The quality of the deception is not necessarily the crucial factor. Will deepfakes change this? Will their mere existence destroy any vestiges of trust in a shared reality? Potentially. But one thing we do know is that the discourse that has grown up around this issue, rather than being something radically new, is part of a much older dynamic.

Back in a previous life I used to make TV documentaries. I always wondered why anyone agreed to take part in them. Most were ordinary people uninterested in fame. Slowly it dawned on me there was something about the process of filming that seduced them. The camera seemed to promise that their experiences had meaning, and ultimately offered a kind of immortality. That said, whenever our contributors saw the films they featured in, they hated them. The way we edited them into our storylines made them feel less powerful, more vulnerable. Instead of immortality we brought the opposite: a total loss of self-control.

Our relationship with visual representations of ourselves always runs along this axis of narcissism and dread: at once promising a defeat of death, but by arousing that desire only to disappoint it, crushingly reinforcing its inevitability. Our fascination with deepfakes strikes me as the latest iteration of this emotional rollercoaster, and its one Grothaus captures very well.

Trust No One: Inside the World of Deepfakes is published by Hodder & Stoughton (18.99). To support the Guardian and the Observer buy a copy at guardianbookshop.com. Delivery charges may apply.

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Trust No One: Inside the World of Deepfakes by Michael Grothaus review disinformations superweapon - The Guardian

Interview With the Vampire actors Antonio Banderas and Thandiwe Newton were among those saluting Anne Rice on Sunday, as Twitter filled with heartfelt tributes to the late authors spooky prose, celebration of feminine eroticism and LGBTQ+ representation.

The revered gothic novelist, whose bestselling debut, Interview With the Vampire, was adapted into a 1994 film starring Brad Pitt and Tom Cruise, died Saturday night at age 80 after suffering a stroke, her son and fellow author Christopher Rice said.

Your Mom wrote some dope stories and her work will always be part of my personal journey, Newton, who played Yvette in Interview With the Vampire, tweeted in response to Christopher Rices eulogy.

Respect to your family and my heart goes out to you in your time of grief.

Banderas, who portrayed Armand in director Neil Jordans film adaptation, also shared Christopher Rices announcement with his own tweet. Anne Rice wrote the screenplay for the movie.

Another day, another legend, tweeted Broadway and Disney star Josh Gad: RIP #AnneRice and thank you for introducing us to a world in which vampires werent simply Dracula, but literary springboards for everything that makes us hungry for immortality, desperate for love, longing for legacy, and searching for humanity.

Theater legend Harvey Fierstein echoed those sentiments. Heartbreaking loss of one of the most colorful imaginations ever, he wrote. She made us believe, as common knowledge, that vampires walk among us. What an achievement! Brava!

Star Trek actor George Takei declared that Anne Rices stories will continue to haunt, thrill and inspire for generations to follow. Cassandra Petersons Elvira hailed Interview With the Vampire as her favorite book of all time.

Literary figures also honored Anne Rice, who pioneered the sub-genre through the Vampire Chronicles and other works, selling more than 150 million copies worldwide.

What a life and what a legacy. My god, tweeted Cinderella Is Dead author Kalynn Bayron. Im heartbroken. I loved her work so much. My heart goes out to her family. Rest easy, Anne.

Anne Rice was an author who had a really complicated (and fascinating) relationship with fans and fandom but she leaves behind quite the literary legacy, that helped pull a genre and monster into the modern-era, tweeted The Monster of Her Age author Danielle Binks. Condolences to those who loved her, and her words.

See more reactions to Anne Rices death below.

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Anne Rice dies: 'Interview With the Vampire' cast tributes - Los Angeles Times

Bulgasal: Immortal Souls is a latest Korean drama that just got much fanbase just with its name. This is the new Korean series that everybody is eagerly waiting for!

The series, Bulgasal: Immortal Souls is directed by Jang Young-Woo.

And the credit for the story goes to Kwon So-Ra and Seo Jae-Won, these two people are the ones who wrote the story for the series. This is a South Korean original series.

We are going the story of two people Dan Hwal portrayed by Lee Jin-Wook and Min Sang-Wonn portrayed by Kwon Na-Ra.

Initially before 600 years, Dan Hwal was a human. In the time while he was in a project as a militarily officer to remove and clean the mess of the leftovers for the past 600 years, he became an immortal.

But, here there is a turn that Min Sang-Woon, this person was used to be an Immortal, but she unfortunately became a mortal, she is currently human now, and she lives as a human being too. She became a mortal, after she has gone through a biggest event that really made her become a mortal. Through that she changed her identity completely, she changed her name, address and everything.

Here comes another character Ok Eul-Tae portrayed by Lee Joon is an immortal, but he takes everything for granted he enjoys his immortality every inch and every minute.

The latest Korean series, the latest original South Korean series, is going to stream on 18th of December 2021, on tvN, and it is going to stream on Saturday and Sunday every week @ 21:00.

Cast Bulgasal: Immortal Souls

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Bulgasal: Immortal Souls: Things You Must Know About the Series - Daily Research Plot

On the season finale of Everything is Canon, Steve is joined by bestselling author Kalynn Bayron, as they close out the year that was, 2021. A big part of the reason Kalynn is here is because This Poison Heart, a book she released all the way back in June, is my absolute favorite book of 2021, you can read my review HERE.

Heres the summary

Briseis has a gift: she can grow plants from tiny seeds to rich blooms with a single touch.

When Briseiss aunt dies and wills her a dilapidated estate in rural New York, Bri and her parents decide to leave Brooklyn behind for the summer. Hopefully there, surrounded by plants and flowers, Bri will finally learn to control her gift. But their new home is sinister in ways they could never have imaginedit comes with a specific set of instructions, an old-school apothecary, and a walled garden filled with the deadliest botanicals in the world that can only be entered by those who share Bris unique family lineage.

When strangers begin to arrive on their doorstep, asking for tinctures and elixirs, Bri learns she has a surprising talent for creating them. One of the visitors is Marie, a mysterious young woman who Bri befriends, only to find that Marie is keeping dark secrets about the history of the estate and its surrounding community. There is more to Bris sudden inheritance than she could have imagined, and she is determined to uncover it . . . until a nefarious group comes after her in search of a rare and dangerous immortality elixir. Up against a centuries-old curse and the deadliest plant on earth, Bri must harness her gift to protect herself and her family.

Not only is Kalynn one of my favorite authors, but she also happens to be one of my favorite people to talk to, and so Im very glad shes here to look back on the year that was with me. We talk about This Poison Heart and the next book in the series, This Wicked Fate, including those incredible covers by Raymond Sebastien, I probe her for updates about some exciting Cinderella is Dead news she dropped a while back, her next series The Vanquishers, and much, much more.

Happy holidays!

To order This Poison Heart and/or pre-order This Wicked Fate, click HERE!

Cover art by Raymond Sebastien.

Everything is Canon

Everything Is Canon: This Poison Heart

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Inside the issue: Sportsperson of the Year, among other notable honors and athletes that made 2021 memorable; The Year in Sports Media and The Year in Pictures; Djokovics wolf-like mentality; and more

NEW YORK, December 15, 2021--(BUSINESS WIRE)--In the Sportsperson of the Year Issue, on sale tomorrow, Sports Illustrated celebrates the years best athletes, moments, photos, media and plays. Sportsperson of the Year Tom Brady tells senior writer Jon Wertheim how hes forged his career longevity and what has changed since he last won the Sportsperson of the Year award in 2005. Muhammad Ali Legacy Award winner Billie Jean King, whose sportsmanship has also spanned decades, is profiled in the issue, along with Athletes of the Year Suni Lee and Caeleb Dressel and Breakthrough Athlete of the Year LaMelo Ball.

This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20211215005789/en/

2021 Sports Illustrated Sportsperson of the Year: Tom Brady (Photo: Business Wire)

On The Cover

According to Jon Wertheim, time is a construct for Tom Brady, measurable in ways other than revolutions around the sun. In his 22nd NFL season, he started his 10th Super Bowl and collected his seventh ring while also being named Super Bowl MVP for the fifth time. At age 44, he leads the league in touchdown passes. We know how statistically outlying his longevity is, but there is much more to the story of this timeless Sportsperson of the Year, only the third athlete to be honored by SI more than once.

Sportsperson of the Year Issue Features

Muhammad Ali Legacy Award, Bille Jean King: In the five decades since she took a stand against the pay disparity between men and women in tennis and won the tennis trailblazer and activist has been an unflinching champion for equality across society, by Jenny Vrentas.

Athletes of the Year: Stefanie Apstein details Suni Lee raising the bar for Team USA, and Pat Forde describes Caeleb Dressel exceeding expectations in Tokyo. According to Chris Mannix, breakthrough Athlete of the Year LaMelo Ball is transforming the previously faceless Hornets into a hot ticket.

The Year in Pictures: Significant photojournalism all shot on assignment for SI; several all-time greats augmented their legacies in 2021, while a new crop of rising stars wrote their first words in the history books.

Also in this issue:

Story continues

Novak Djokovic is the most controversial man in tennis, soon to be the most accomplished, says Jon Wertheim.

Making Mamba: Mark Bechtel reviews the new book The Rise: Kobe Bryant and the Pursuit of Immortality.

The Year in Media: SI names Formula 1 documentary Drive to Survive the Series of the Year, plus the Sports Media Controversy of the Year, Best Documentary of the Year, and more.

Alex Prewitt on the sudden shortage of an oft-overlooked football mainstay: the end zone pylon.

SI Full Frame: The dramatically lit shot of Herschel Walker from 1981 in pre-Superdome lightbulbs.

Faces in the Crowd: Identical twins Lex and Leo Young, 105-year-old Julia Hawkins, and soccer stand-out Seven Castain.

Order the Sportsperson of the Year Issue or Subscribe to Sports Illustrated today. Follow Sports Illustrated on Twitter and Instagram.

About Sports Illustrated

Sports Illustrated (SI) is an unparalleled and influential leader recognized for shaping modern culture and uniting athletes, teams and fans worldwide. SIs award-winning media enterprise brings powerful storytelling to life across platforms ranging from Emmy-winning video to the monthly print magazine with a 67-year heritage. Get in-depth features, probing profiles, and iconic and beloved photography from the best writers and photojournalists in the game at SI.com. In July, the American Society of Magazine Editors announced that SI won Best Sports and Fitness Cover in their 2021 contest with "Empty Arena."

About The Arena Group

The Arena Group creates dynamic, digital destinations that delight consumers with stories and news about the things they love their favorite sports teams, the inside scoop on personal finance, and the latest on lifestyle essentials. The company's robust media ecosystem brings together consumers, publishers and advertisers while harnessing the authority of trusted brands and the editorial prowess of leading writers and editors. For more on best-in-class capabilities in direct sales and programmatic advertising, data, SEO, social, and operations, visit http://www.thearenagroup.net.

About Sportsperson of the Year

For the first time in the history of the awards, Sports Illustrated unveiled its Sportsperson of the Year presented by FTX live during the Sports Illustrated Awards (SI) presented by Pepsi Stronger Together from the Seminole Hard Rock Hotel & Casino in Hollywood, FL on December 7, 2021. The most prestigious honor in sports media, Sportsperson of the Year, is an annual award given to an athlete, coach or team who best represents the spirit and ideals of sportsmanship, character and performance. Medium Rare produced this years event in conjunction with ABG Entertainment.

View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20211215005789/en/

Contacts

Media Contact: Rachael Fink, comms@thearenagroup.net

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Sports Illustrateds Sportsperson of the Year Issue Celebrates Best Athletes, Teams, and Sports Moments of 2021 - Yahoo Finance