Category Archives: Mind Uploading

While many tech moguls dream of changing the way we live with new smart devices or social media apps, one Russian internet millionaire is trying to change nothing less than our destiny, by making it possible to upload a human brain to a computer, reports Tristan Quinn.

"Within the next 30 years," promises Dmitry Itskov, "I am going to make sure that we can all live forever."

It sounds preposterous, but there is no doubting the seriousness of this softly spoken 35-year-old, who says he left the business world to devote himself to something more useful to humanity. "I'm 100% confident it will happen. Otherwise I wouldn't have started it," he says.

It is a breathtaking ambition, but could it actually be done? Itskov doesn't have too much time to find out.

"If there is no immortality technology, I'll be dead in the next 35 years," he laments. Death is inevitable - currently at least - because as we get older the cells that make up our bodies lose their ability to repair themselves, making us vulnerable to cardiovascular disease and other age-related conditions that kill about two-thirds of us.

So Itskov is putting a slice of his fortune in to a bold plan he has devised to bypass ageing. He wants to use cutting-edge science to unlock the secrets of the human brain and then upload an individual's mind to a computer, freeing them from the biological constraints of the body.

"The ultimate goal of my plan is to transfer someone's personality into a completely new body," he says.

Itskov's interest in making the impossible possible began as a child in the Soviet Union in the 1980s. "My biggest dream was to be a cosmonaut, to fly in to outer space," he says. One science fiction novel made a lasting impression: "The hero took some immortality pill and he ended up flying the orbit of Earth. I remember myself questioning what I was going to do if I'm immortal."

But does his plan to allow us all to upload our minds to computers amount to anything more than sci-fi? The scientific director of Itskov's 2045 Initiative, Dr Randal Koene - a neuroscientist who worked as a research professor at Boston University's Center for Memory and Brain - laughs off any suggestion Itskov might have lost touch with reality.

"All of the evidence seems to say in theory it's possible - it's extremely difficult, but it's possible," he says. "So then you could say someone like that is visionary, but not mad because that implies you're thinking of something that's just impossible, and that's not the case."

The theoretical possibility Randal refers to is rooted in questions about how our brains work that neuroscience has yet to answer. Our brains are made up of about 86 billion neurons, connected cells that send information to each other by firing electrical charges that propagate through this organ in our skulls like waves.

But exactly how the brain generates our mind is a mystery like no other in science, according to the neurobiologist Prof Rafael Yuste of Columbia University. "The challenge is precisely how to go from a physical substrate of cells that are connected inside this organ, to our mental world, our thoughts, our memories, our feelings," he says.

Find out more

Horizon: The Immortalist, produced and directed by Tristan Quinn, will be shown on BBC 2 at 20:00 on Wednesday 16 March 2016 - viewers in the UK can catch up later on the BBC iPlayer

To try to unlock its workings, many neuroscientists approach the brain as if it were a computer. In this analogy the brain turns inputs, sensory data, into outputs, our behaviour, through computations. This is where the theoretical argument for mind uploading starts. If this process could be mapped, the brain could perhaps be copied in a computer, along with the individual mind it gives rise to.

That's the view of Dr Ken Hayworth, a neuroscientist who maps slivers of mouse brain at the Janelia Research Campus in Virginia by day, and by night grapples with the problem of how to upload his mind. Ken believes mapping the connectome - the complex connections of all the neurons in a brain - holds the key, because he believes it encodes all the information that makes us who we are, though this is not proven. "In the same sense that my computer is really just the ones and zeros on my hard drive, and I don't care what happens as long as those ones and zeros make it to the next computer it should be the same thing with me," he says, "I don't care if my connectome is implemented in this physical body or a computer simulation controlling a robotic body."

But Ken is a realist. "We are pitifully far away from mapping a human connectome," he acknowledges. "To put it in perspective, to image a whole fly brain it is going to take us approximately one to two years. The idea of mapping a whole human brain with the existing technology that we have today is simply impossible." And there's another theoretical challenge. Even if we could create the wiring diagram of a human brain, mind uploading would also most likely require reading the constant activity of all its neurons too.

Here Itskov might get some unexpected help, according to Yuste - who helped bring about the world's biggest neuroscience research project, the Brain Initiative. As part of this $6bn American programme aimed at solving the mysteries of brain disorders like Alzheimer's, he is hoping to map the continual interaction of neurons - the patterns of firing - in the brain over time, "We want to measure every spike from all the neurons at once simultaneously. Many people said it's just impossible."

It is an approach that does not rely on mapping the connectome first. In research yet to be published, Yuste has for the first time imaged over time the hypnotic electrical flashes that make up the activity of nearly all the neurons - up to several thousand - in one of the simplest nervous systems in evolution, a tiny invertebrate called a hydra. "It was very exciting," he says. But "today we just cannot tell you what these patterns mean. So it's a bit like listening in on a conversation in a foreign language that you don't understand."

Within 15 years Yuste hopes to map - and interpret - the activity of all the neurons in a mouse cortex. But the ultimate aim is to read the activity of the human brain.

"If the brain were a digital computer, if you wanted to upload the mind you need to be able to decipher it or download it first. So I think the Brain Initiative is a step that is necessary for this uploading to happen."

But Itskov is far from home and dry. At Duke University, one leading neuroscientist argues that the brain's dynamic complexity - from which the human condition emerges - cannot be replicated. "You cannot code intuition; you cannot code aesthetic beauty; you cannot code love or hate," says Dr Miguel Nicolelis, who is developing a mind-controlled exoskeleton aimed at helping the paralysed walk. "There is no way you will ever see a human brain reduced to a digital medium. It's simply impossible to reduce that complexity to the kind of algorithmic process that you will have to have to do that."

Yuste is also very far from certain the brain works like a computer and could ever be copied in a machine. But because neuroscience cannot yet explain how exactly the brain gives rise to us and prove that mind uploading is impossible, he believes society should start considering what the consequences might be if Itskov succeeded in his ambition.

"The pathway that leads with the new neural technologies to our understanding of the brain is the same pathway that could lead, theoretically, to the possibility of mind uploading," says Yuste. "Scientists that are involved in these methods have the responsibility to think ahead."

Mind uploading would usher in a world fraught with risks.

"If you could replicate the mind and upload it into a different material, you can in principle clone minds," says Yuste. "These are complicated issues because they deal with the core of defining what is a person."

Itskov is more sanguine: "I will answer you to the question of ethics by the opinion which was given to me by his holiness the Dalai Llama when I visited him in 2013. His point was that you can do everything if your motivation is to help people."

But this assurance is not enough for Yuste, who sits on the Brain Initiative's ethics panel: "I would put mind uploading in the list of the topics that should be very carefully discussed and thought through."

Itskov is already planning his endless life. "For the next few centuries I envision having multiple bodies, one somewhere in space, another hologram-like, my consciousness just moving from one to another."

It is estimated that 107 billion people have died before us. As our understanding of the brain advances in the decades ahead it will become clear whether Itskov is really the momentous visionary he claims to be, or merely the latest dreamer of impossible dreams.

Tristan Quinn produced and directed Horizon: The Immortalist, which will be shown on BBC 2 Wednesday at 20:00 on 16 March 2016 - viewers in the UK can catch up later on the BBC iPlayer

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The immortalist: Uploading the mind to a computer - BBC News

Celebrating International Womens Day on Sunday, men can start taking over their partners simple daily chores without fear of being labeled bucin.

Bucin is a portmanteau of the Indonesian termbudak cinta(slave to love) popularized among millennials and members of Generation Z as submission by men or women to their partners.

Local baby boomers have their own acronym for men who are dominated by their partners, which is ISTI, or Ikatan Suami Takut Istri (the Association of Husbands Afraid of their Wives). The other portmanteau with a religious nuance is ISTIQOMAH, which is short for Ikatan Suami Takut Istri Kalau di Rumah (the Association of Husbands Afraid of Wives When at Home), which usually refers to married men who go wild only when outside of their homes.

In a patriarchal society like Indonesia, these terms, normally used in jokes among men, only reflect deep-rooted gender inequality in the country. The cynical abbreviations suggest that men should instead demonstrate supremacy over women, for example by way of abuse or by leaving all the household chores to women.

The unequal gender relations are believed to be the root of many problems both in the domestic and public spheres. Marital rape, sexual harassment either verbal or physical, disparity in wages, for instance, are rampant and widely accepted as normal practices.

The awareness about a level playing field between men and women came to the fore, at least historically, in Indonesia in the 19th century through Raden Ajeng Kartini. Fast forward, the sweeping reforms in 1998 played a pivotal part in promoting gender equality in the country. Thanks to the changes, Indonesia has seen its first female president, and more women have held key ministerial posts and public offices such as regents and governors.

But gender inequality has remained an unresolved issue. How to help end the gender disparity, which the world has accepted as a major barrier to sustainable development?

You, men, could start with simple actions at home, such as sharing the burden of household jobs like washing the dishes and doing the laundry with your wives. In a show of respect for gender equality, husbands in Asias developed nations like South Korea take one-month paternity leave to help their wives take care of their new-born babies.

I am married to a woman from the Minang ethnic group in West Sumatra. My parents-in-law appear to feel ashamed when they see me washing the dishes after dinner. This despite the fact that Minang is one of the few ethnicities in the country that adopts the matrilineal kinship system.

Another small step is appreciating womens work and letting them develop themselves intellectually and publicly. In this regard, the husbands of female ministers and the late Taufik Kiemas, husband of former president Megawati Soekarnoputri, deserve appreciation.

You do not have to take to the streets to support the sexual violence eradication bill or to reject the family resilience bill. But if you do care, you can simply express your views on social media. For baby boomers, you may rally support for gender equality in your Facebook, Twitter and Instagram posts.

The International Womens Day commemoration comes against the backdrop of potential prosecution of actress Tara Basro under the draconian Electronic Transactions and Information (ITE) Law for uploading a black-and-white semi-naked picture of herself on Twitter. Tara has since deleted the post.

Of course you can join the International Womens Day march at the National Monument in Central Jakarta this Sunday. Never mind people who may call you a social justice warrior for supporting womens equal rights.

You will also contribute to gender-equality promotion by stopping making sexist jokes and rape jokes during conversations where female colleagues are present, as the anecdotes may hurt them. It is okay not to befriend sexist people.

You can also skip seminars and public discussions that feature male panellists only. If you organize a seminar or other events, you can promote female scholars from various fields, ranging from politics to religion, which this nation has in abundance.

Religion, or rather the interpretation of religious teachings actually, is the enemy of gender equality. The family resilience bill, which has been proposed by a number of politicians from several parties, speaks volumes for the efforts to give the state the authority to breach the privacy of its citizens, particularly women.

Those proposing the draft law are apparently inspired by old values or the interpretation of religious teachings that reduce womens roles to mere domestic work rather than in the public sphere.

Indonesia has an association of women clerics, who study and develop female religious teachings. The groups activities are still minor but with the help of the media and progressive people from all walks of life, the moderate principles will further spread.

Giving women more opportunities they deserve is important if we are to support equality for all genders. More affirmative action is also needed to help build a just and peaceful world for all genders.

It is quite easy for men to uphold equality for men and women. It starts from simple acts and starts with you.

***

Staff writer of The Jakarta Post and founder of the Alliance of Journalists for Pluralism (Sejuk)

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Nothing wrong with being bucin, respecting women - The Jakarta Post - Jakarta Post

Hollyoaks actress Stephanie Davis has been hospitalised with a chest infection.

Uploading a video onto her Instagram account, the 26-year-old informed her followers about the recent health scare, which is why she's been inactive on social media.

"The reason why I've not been about is because I've not been well," she began. "I've not wanted to post about it, or say anything. I didn't want anyone to worry because I'm alright now."

Related: Hollyoaks star Stephanie Davis opens up about high-functioning autism diagnosis

Stephanie continued: "I have been in for over a week. But I feel like I have turned a corner so I just wanted to come on.

"Sorry about the way I look... I've just been really run down for a long time, obviously since my relapse last year, and obviously when I tried to... and everything. I just haven't looked after myself for a long time, my chest, everything like that."

Last month, the soap star bravely opened up about a previous suicide attempt in an emotional statement.

"To feel like your life isn't worth something is the worst feeling I've ever experienced in my life, total despair and helplessness that I wouldn't wish on anyone," she wrote.

"And then I just got rapidly worse, I just gave up, I fought so hard to carry on to try, but I couldn't see a way out."

Adding that she was "in a really good place right now", she urged anyone experiencing a period of mental ill health to reach out, saying: "If it's not OK it's not the end. We can and will fight this together."

Hollyoaks airs Mondays through Fridays at 6.30pm on Channel 4, with first-look episodes airing on E4 at 7pm.

We would encourage anyone who identifies with the topics raised in this article to reach out. Organisations who can offer support include Samaritans on 116 123 (www.samaritans.org) or Mind on 0300 123 3393 (www.mind.org.uk). Readers in the US are encouraged to visit mentalhealth.gov or the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention.

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Hollyoaks' Stephanie Davis hospitalised with chest infection - digitalspy.com

I owe you a yoyo today.

This phrase started a whole database of words and idioms that researchers have used to help patients be understood after theyve been diagnosed with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or ALS.

We picked that phrase when we started the project in 2014 because that phrase has a lot of interesting resonance components to it, CEO of the Cambridge-based ALS Therapy Development Institute (ALS TDI) Steven Perrin said. Its used in a lot of speech analysis scientific studies over the years, and so we copied it.

Starting with just this sentence, and collecting thousands more, Perrin sent the data to Google in the hopes of garnering better ways to track the progression of the disease. But it grew into a project that could find ways to help voice recognition technology understand compromised speech, and, eventually, translate that speech back into a persons original voice.

Project Euphonia, I would say, started by accident, Perrin said.

It started as just another way of collecting data for ALS TDIs precision medicine program in 2014.

If there were 100 newly diagnosed patients in the room here with us, I couldnt tell you which one is going to lose their battle with ALS in two months, and which one could live as long as Stephen Hawking, Perrin said.

So the precision medicine program sought a better way to measure ALSs progression by learning from those living with the neurodegenerative disease.

And since no one had ever tried the program for ALS, Perrin said they decided to record as much data in as many forms as possible like asking 600 questions on the history of the patients life, sequencing their full genomes after quarterly blood drawings, and asking for monthly recordings of their voice.

They moved forward analyzing most of the data except for the recordings, having had no idea what to do with them.

But then, Perrin said he met with Google and asked if they could help look at the voice recordings to see if they could correlate the clients voice with the diseases progression.

At first they laughed and said, Ah thats not big enough data for Google.

But a year later, once ALS TDI had 600 people in the program uploading monthly recordings, Google said yes.

Using a fourier transformation to convert the WAV file recordings into colorimetric patterns, or image files, Google applied its machine learning algorithm to the recordings.

Through that, they were able to more sensitively predict disease progression than anything else were using in ALS, Perrin said.

Googles A.I. model trains itself independently, which is why it requires so much data.

The more data it has, the more it can pick out patterns from the WAV files after theyve become image files.

Thats when Perrin said Google saw a light bulb go off.

They said to us, you know, we never thought about it before, but people lose their voice and we have all of their voice recordings before they lost them, Perrin said. Maybe we could reconstruct somebodys voice.

And so Project Euphonia began. At first, only having access to data from patients with ALS, Perrin and Google saw it as a way to adapt voice recognition technology to better help anyone with voice impairment issues. But Perrin said the project has developed a broader goal: to restore patients original voices.

Sure, theres devices out there now that help with communication, but out comes this computerized voice thats not your own, he said. Its kind of sterile, its not the most inviting thing.

Perrin said its been profound to watch people use Project Euphonia and hear their own voice come out of a computer.

One patients voice, once it was fully reconstructed, sounded so close to his original that his wife called Perrin in tears.

She hadnt heard her husbands voice since 2010.

Perrin said sharing your voice as part of the program is free to any patient who wants to contribute, and most do, despite a diagnosis telling them they only have a maximum of five years to live.

Like Andrea Lytle Peet, who was diagnosed with ALS in May 2014 at 33 years old and founded the Team Drea Foundation while also participating in ALS TDIs Precision Medicine Program.

I realized when I was diagnosed that I could choose whether to be depressed or to live life the best way I knew how the time would pass either way, Peet said in an email. I have chosen to dedicate my remaining time to finding a cure for ALS and helping to advance the science so that one day, no other families will have to go through this cruel disease.

Only a year before her diagnosis, she had been doing nine workouts a week to take part in a half Ironman triathlon in September 2013.

Peet said she went to five neurologists before getting her diagnosis, and shes been fighting ALS for five and a half years since, outliving the normal life expectancy of two to five years.

I went from the strongest Id ever been to walking with a cane in eight months, she said.

And everything about her life and future changed.

My husband and I no longer plan to have children, Peet said. We dont get to imagine growing old together. I cashed out my 401k because I wont live long enough to retire.

But shes grateful for what she can still do, like speaking despite slurred words, walking with a walker, eating, driving, and using the bathroom on her own.

These are all things that most people take for granted, but people with ALS lose over time, Peet said. I will never take for granted the neurological glue that is still holding me together.

She said after the diagnosis, she was nervous about a lot of things.

I worried after I was diagnosed that I would no longer have a purely happy thought, Peet said. But the happy memories are sweeter, and we dont often argue about little things that dont matter. We take adventures now we dont wait for someday anymore.

And Project Euphonia has eased some of her worries, too, giving her independence, allowing her to turn on lights, the TV, or lock the door using just her voice.

Peet said shes been using the technology every day for the past six months.

This technology also allows me to continue giving presentations for my foundation to keep raising money for ALS research, she said. It live captions what I say and I dont have to worry about being understood.

The project has also offered her peace of mind.

If my hands stop working, I know that I can use my voice to turn on the TV, turn on a podcast, or set an alarm, she said. Any small measure of independence means so much when youve lost everything else.

Perrin said losing the ability to speak might be the most traumatic part of the ALS disease course.

Communication is key to our existence, our well being, our mental health, he said.

And Project Euphonia is giving patients the ability to not worry as much about losing access to that vital part of being human.

While it took almost four years for ALS TDI and Google to get to where they are today with the project, theres still more to be adjusted.

Perrin said the systems arent automated yet.

Google takes the audio recordings from ALS TDI and their A.I. learns how to translate them, but to fully recreate and fine tune someones voice, Google needs more than twenty minutes of perfectly clear, pre-recorded audio of a patients voice before ALS affected it.

The problem is, aside from wedding speeches or recorded business conference calls, most people dont regularly record their voice.

I think the vision is to try to get it down to a minimal amount of high-quality audio, Perrin said. Less than a minute would be optimal, because probably everybody could find that.

He said theyre moving forward nonetheless, continuing to collect words and get to a point where the translation is automatic.

But the progress is ongoing, and its not going to happen overnight, Perrin said.

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A Cambridge non-profit partnered with Google to help people with ALS preserve their voice through A.I. - Boston.com

Sophie Allison, who creates music under the moniker Soccer Mommy, can do no wrong. On her latest LP, the 10-track color theory, listeners watch her make sense of her own melancholia. Its heart-wrenching and enthralling, and it provides whats missing from most of the industry: feeling.

Soccer Mommy began creating music under her stage name and uploading it to Bandcamp in 2015. While she was studying music business at New York University, she played her first show, which shortly after resulted in a record deal with Fat Possum Records. She dropped out of NYU two years later, and since then, she has released three full-length albums and concocted her own formidable form of catharsis.

Even though meaningful music tends to go unnoticed, Soccer Mommy is well on her way to becoming a household name, already going on tour with the likes of Kacey Musgraves, Paramore and Vampire Weekend, among other notable names. She deserves every second of it, too.

Color theory goes beyond merely divulging raw human emotion. Soccer Mommy takes that, intertwines it with brutally honest lyricism and guitars that are delicate but can still roar and formed one of the best albums of 2020 already. The opener, bloodstream, sounds like the intro to an angsty teenage 2000s film with its acoustic guitar beginning and airy vocals. The tenderness of night swimming is inexplicably infectious. The candid nature of royal screw up is bound to rip your heart out and replace it with perpetual chills. Every track deserves accolades, but there are three that just edge the rest:

3. crawling in my skin

Though the melody of crawling in my skin may evoke feelings of euphoria, the lyrics will do anything but. Soccer Mommys tone and her supporting instrumentation of gentle guitars and drums completely juxtapose her inability to escape her demons. Despite their evil nature, they are something she feels she can no longer live without: I watch it creep and crawl through my room / But I cant move / Sedate me all the time / Dont leave me with my mind. There are no flaws to be found within this track.

2. up the walls

Despite having the shortest run time on the album, clocking in at two minutes and 44 seconds, up the walls packs one of the heaviest punches. Replicating a tone like that of Billie Eilish in her slower songs, Soccer Mommy reflects on a past love and how itll never make its way back to the present. Beside tranquil guitars, she admits nothing will ever feel as comforting again: Cause no ones really known me like you did when we were young / Our love was our everything / Everything you want but back then.

1. gray light

Closing the album is gray light, a track about watching a loved one suffer and pondering on your own fears. Guided by a simple yet stunning guitar line, Soccer Mommy reveals that as she is forced to watch her mom decline, she cant get away from the thought of her own death: I cant lose it, the feeling Im going down / I cant lose it; Im watching my mother drown. If goosebumps dont appear at some point, its safe to say youre not human. The track is wholly cathartic, and its the best on color theory.

Rating: 4.5/5

@bre_offenberger

bo844517@ohio.edu

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Album Review: The best 3 tracks from Soccer Mommy's melancholy masterpiece 'color theory' - The Post

This is because TikTok doesnt know you yet. Where other social platforms connect you with friends, family or colleagues, TikTok doesnt care about people you may know. Its only concerned with what you actually want to see, and once the apps algorithm really gets to work analysing why one video holds your attention just a second longer than another, or why you swiped back three videos to watch one over again the AI powering its recommendations engine begins to feel scarily godlike.

Thats when the art of TikTok begins to reveal itself. It took the film industry decades to establish itself as a coherent system with its own internal logic, but in just a few years TikTok has done the same. What seems messy and chaotic at first quickly coagulates into a highly coded and creative ecology that pillages older media forms from Funniest Home Videos to vines and repurposes them to new ends.

The opening bars of AC/DCs Thunderstruck are recreated using only a babys gurgles. God invents seahorses: "what if baby saxophones could swim?" A woman correctly inserts a USB stick on the first try and a heavenly chorus erupts.

If this sounds like cringey internet fare circa 2005, its because the artistry of TikTok doesnt translate well into words. Its important that most of its videos are without speech, since the musical soundtrack does so much of the talking. When words are needed, theyre delivered via on-screen captions.

Nineteen-year-old Victorian Heath Kirley posted his first TikTok in January last year. Hes standing in his kitchen putting the finishing touches on a cryptic yellow costume with an oversized M on his chest as the early bars of Soulja Boys Pretty Boy Swag play out. When the bass drops, hes transformed into the yellow M&M.

A year later, he has 2.1 million followers.

"There were some weeks where 100,000 new people would follow me," he says. "It still blows my mind."

At first TikTok was just a private joke, a place to post whatever he thought might amuse a few strangers. "Until one of my videos blew up overnight. It got more than a million views and I was like, maybe this is more than just a creative outlet."

That video? "It was a joke around getting a tattoo of the word bread."

Again, its really hard to convey the humour of TikToks in words.

Most TikTok videos begin when the maker chooses its signature "sound", selecting a short audio track from the vast library the app offers. In most cases this is a song excerpt, though there are snippets from TV shows and stand-up routines too. The user then shoots a video to accompany the track, inserting their own take on the original.

The audio-first nature of TikTok means that almost every video is a kind of cover version, and a videos creativity emerges in the way each user delivers their own spin on an established product. Youll hear the same 15-second snatch of song hundreds of times, but with each iteration a user will respond to all of the previous versions by throwing in a last-second twist, a new punchline or jawdropping physical feat.

This format of creative expression within a formulaic structure extends to dance videos, lipsynchs, comic memes and skits. The TikTok algorithm rewards originality within set constraints most videos take their cues from a previous dance, joke, trick or stunt and then make it their own.

A sophisticated visual and aural vocabulary has quickly evolved. Comic videos almost always end prematurely, cutting off mid-sentence so the viewer has to finish the gag. Conversely, a moment of absurdity (someone catching a falling bottle with their butt cheeks) will freeze while the moment is repeated from eight increasingly extreme camera angles.

TikToks creators might be crafty, but is any of this art? The study of aesthetics has long held to categories such as the beautiful and the sublime, but US cultural theorist Sianne Ngai argues that more relevant categories for understanding art today are the zany, the cute and the interesting. Its the first of those that helps explain TikToks relevance.

"Zany" sounds like a backhanded compliment at best. It conjures something too busy, trying too hard, overreaching itself. If the zany is fun, its also stressful, perhaps even fun because its stressful. Think manic comedians from Lucille Ball to Jim Carrey, but also the visual too-muchness of Star Wars films today, the 100km/h delivery of Youtube personalities, the streaming series you inhale in one sitting. For Ngai, the zany is the experience of "too many things coming at (you) quickly and at once".

TikTok is undeniably zany. The majority of videos consciously cultivate a naive aesthetic, looking more like the home videos you produced at the age of eight than the glossed and airbrushed imagery on other social platforms. This in part excuses the dorkiness that comes with being zany TikTok is undeniably dorky, too because we dont judge the eight-year-old pretending to be a grown up with the same rigour wed judge a professional actor.

Ngai says that the zany is a category worth considering seriously because it reflects the experience of modern times. From the silent antics of Charlie Chaplin and Buster Keaton through to the frantic, frenetic busyness of TikTok acts, zany humour collapses the distinction between fun and work, between the demands of everyday life and the supposed escape of privacy. Its hard to think of a better description of social media than that. With too many things coming at you quickly and at once, a zany response might seem the only reasonable one.

TikTok would rather its users be zany, too. More than any other social platform it sells itself as a low-conflict zone, promoting wholesome content and actively removing material that might provoke divisive responses (how it interprets that is another matter). Where other platforms increase views by ratcheting up the outrage, Tiktok appears almost entirely absent of capital-P politics.

At the level of lived experience, though, TikTok is rife with politics. Many of its memes straddle the faultlines of race, sexuality, gender and other seismically volatile subjects.

They do this with humour. Theres a popular meme that presents a scene with the caption "What I think I look like" before cutting to a variation captioned "What everybody else sees". In one iteration, an African-Australian teen is browsing a Coles aisle in a contemplative fashion. As the soundtrack switches up a notch, "what everybody else sees" is the same man stuffing items from the shelves into his pockets.

But even this is zany, and the slapstick element is jokes finisher: its only on the third or fourth viewing that you notice his hand gets stuck in a box, his keychain snagged on the shelf. Its a comment about racial stereotyping wrapped up in a clown suit.

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The content on TikTok appears to be far more diverse than elsewhere on the internet, though its entirely likely the apps algorithm is controlling that sense of diversity. Users have managed to gather a surprising amount of information as to how that algorithm works.

Melbourne high schooler Harvey Petito has a million and a half followers, but says that follower counts matter far less on TikTok than on other platforms. "The TikTok algorithm sends your videos out to people who arent actually following you too. Some weeks Ill look at my analytics and my content has reached over 20 million people, even though I have 1.4 million followers."

"The best part is that its not about followers," says Kirley. "Its about your originality and your creativity. There are accounts with zero followers and Im pretty sure, no matter what, the algorithm will still show their video to a very small amount of people. It all depends on how they interact with it."

Kirley is right. In the few hours after uploading, each TikTok video is seen by a few hundred random viewers, which is why youll be shown clips with just a few likes sandwiched between those with a million or more. How that small batch of viewers respond to the video is scrutinised by the app how much of the clip is actually watched, and how many times is it replayed or shared? The rule seems to be that if a video is liked once for every 10 times its viewed, its then catapulted out to a much larger audience. This is where the AI steps in and begins analysing content: is there hateful or divisive material in there, or anything that breaks the apps terms of service? If it passes the test, its shot out to an even bigger audience.

The next trigger is velocity a video that increases its likes by 20 per cent in a day will graduate to the next level of promotion, which is why TikTok is specifically geared for sudden viral spikes.

Engagement isnt based on the followers you already have, which is why first-time posters can rack up the kind of viewing numbers that would be impossible to attain elsewhere.

A relatively popular video will be circulated at this mass level for four days, and if it performs well enough a flesh-and-blood TikTok staffer will review the clip themselves and decide if it should be one of the tiny fraction of videos to go super-viral.

Reach that point and you might find yourself with one or two million followers. TikTokers wear their fame light, though. Harvey Petito is famous enough to be regularly recognised on the street, but hes more occupied by the same concerns as most other 16-year-olds. "It can be hard finding the time and energy to film when youve been at school all day and then had sports after school or something like that, then you come home and have to shower and get dressed to make tik toks when you know youve still got homework and stuff to do."

When Kirleys views went through the roof, things got pretty zany. "When it was all happening I felt it was something I had to do on the daily, to put all my time towards it, but Ive realised now and this sounds a bit weird that its not as significant as you might think it is ... Ive gotten to a point where I post what I want to post when I want to post it."

John Bailey is a contributor to The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald.

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TikTok: Art in 15 second slices - The Age

Several cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin, monero and zcash were featured on the recently released and highly anticipated second season of Altered Carbon, a cyberpunk Netflix series set about 400 years in the future. A scene from the show clearly depicts a shop where prices are set in crypto, with no fiat in sight.

Also Read: Cryptocurrency Explained on the Latest Episode of The Simpsons

Will the cryptocurrencies of today still be in use in the early 25th century? The creative minds at Netflix seem to think so.

Altered Carbon is a cyberpunk television series featuring off-world mining colonies, extinct space aliens, rogue artificial intelligence agents, mind uploading, digital immortality, corrupt corporate overloads and sword-wielding Yakuza members fighting against gritty bounty hunters armed with laser pistols. To this list of tropes we can now add using crypto assets to facilitate shopping for contraband and other illicit items.

The second season of Altered Carbon was released on Thursday, February 27, 2020, and it stars Anthony Mackie, best known for playing Falcon in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. The plot takes place approximately 30 years after the first season, which was mainly set in the year 2384, placing the events of the second season in the early 25th century.

The world of Altered Carbon suffers from extreme economic inequality and focuses on the effects that has on society. As such, the need for money is a central driver of events in the show but the characters usually only refer to it as credits and by no other name. However, a scene in the fifth episode of the second season reveals that, at least in some markets, cryptocurrencies are the real medium of exchange in this dark future.

Without giving away any spoilers, you can see that when the hero goes to get some gear from an augments repair shop for a major adventure all the prices in the venue are set in cryptos with the logos of bitcoin, monero, zcash, litecoin and a few others clearly shown. This might have been used to give the place the look and feel of a real life darknet market.

While it is impossible to predict how the economy will look in 400 years, the shows creators are most probably right about the lack of support for current fiat currencies in a future where humanity is spread out across dozens of plants. So if you ever plan to buy a replacement cyborg hand, military-grade clone body or the ability to enhance your senses with wolf DNA on the black market, youd better hold some privacy-enabling cryptos just in case.

Bitcoin has recently returned to appear more frequently on television, beyond the financial news shows where the topic is often in the headlines. In February 2020, for example, animated family sitcom The Simpsons featured an almost two-minute segment explaining how cryptocurrency and blockchain work with the actor who played Sheldon Cooper on The Big Bang Theory. In the segment, the animated Parsons tries to prove that he is not a nerd and actually super cool by the fact that he is talking about the subject.

In contrast, some parts of the media often like to employ anti-crypto tropes such as that bitcoin is only used by hackers or criminals. A recent example of this came from an episode of True Life Crime, a new series on MTV, that focused on the story of a $5 million SIM swapping scam. The producers brought on to talk about the incident included Rachel Siegel, a bitcoin advocate and proponent of mass adoption, but cut out all the positive things she had to say about cryptocurrencies.

What do you think about Netflixs Altered Carbon showing cryptocurrencies being used in the year 2400? Share your thoughts in the comments section below.

Images courtesy of Shutterstock, Netflix, Fair Use.

Verify and track bitcoin cash transactions on our BCH Block Explorer, the best of its kind anywhere in the world. Also, keep up with your holdings, BCH and other coins, on our market charts at Bitcoin.com Markets, another original and free service from Bitcoin.com.

Avi Mizrahi is an economist and entrepreneur who has been covering Bitcoin as a journalist since 2013. He has spoken about the promise of cryptocurrency and blockchain technology at numerous financial conferences around the world, from London to Hong-Kong.

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Bitcoin, Monero and Zcash Will Still Be Used in the Year 2414 According to Netflix's Altered Carbon - Bitcoin News

Got something on your mind, Britney Spears??

The pop symbol astonished her Instagram fans on Tuesday by uploading a message condemning those that play mind video games!

Video: Britney Shares The Moment Her Foot Broke

Eyebrows were elevated after Brit shared a photo of message that reviewed:

Mind video games do not make me think you are strange or intriguing. Mind video games do make me think you are a waste of my power, as well as a waste of my time.

Preach, gurl!

But the inquiry is that would certainly risk to play mind video games with Godney!?

Surely, it could not be her ever before helpful guy, Sam Asghari, whom Brit commemorated on her Gram simply a day previously, sharing:

No manner in which male plays mind video games with his lioness! At the very least, we sure wish not!

Maybe Brit was sending out a message to somebody else in her life? Or maybe she was simply passing along Insta- knowledge that reverberated with her.

What do U assume, Perezcious viewers? Ch- ch-check out the message (listed below) as well as speak up in the remarks.

[Image via WENN]

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Britney Spears Posts Cryptic Message About 'Mind Games' A Day After Getting Loved Up With Sam Asghari! - The Union Journal

LinkedIn is the worlds leading social platform for business professionals.

Founded in 2002, the social network has grown to over 600 million active users from around the globe. On the site, users are able to highlight their professional experience, network with new and existing business connections, share thought leadership articles, and even apply to jobs. On the other end, employers use the platform to advertise open positions and recruit qualified talent.

If this is your first experience using LinkedIn, youll quickly learn that its very user-friendly and no more difficult to use than other social networks. Refer to this comprehensive guide to find everything you need to do in order to make the most of your LinkedIn profile.

If youre looking for something specific, feel free to skip ahead:Creating a LinkedIn profileHow to edit profile summaryHow to add experienceHow to add skillsUsing LinkedIn connectionsHow to change profile URLHow to post an article on LinkedInLinkedIn profile tipsHow to delete your account

LinkedIns interface is set up very similar to other social media platforms. Users are prompted to create a profile detailing their career experience, education, and any relevant skills or volunteer activities.

Once youre signed up, you are given access to your LinkedIn feed, which is powered by an algorithm that delivers status updates from your connections as well as other content that is deemed useful or relevant. The feed will populate with more content as you connect with more people and grow your network.

Users also have the option to follow high-profile industry influencers such as Oprah, Katie Couric, and Richard Branson.

To create a LinkedIn profile, start by creating an account. Be sure to choose an email that you check frequently, as you want to stay on top of any notifications or connection requests that you receive.

1. Fill out your basic information including your full name and phone number2. Upload a professional photo3. Add your location4. Import your contacts list

Once your account is ready, its time to start building out the rest of your profile. A LinkedIn profile is set up similar to a traditional resume. At the top is your picture with a headline, along with a short summary section.

The summary section of your LinkedIn profile is intended to be very similar to the type of summary that is usually included in a resume.

1. Click the Me icon at the top of the homepage2. Select View Profile3. Click the pencil icon on the right side of the About section4. Fill out summary text and click Save

Source: LinkedIn

Along with your picture and headline, your LinkedIn summary is one of the first things that someone viewing your profile will see. To put your best foot forward, its important to have a summary that is professional and up-to-date.

When it comes to what you say in your summary, its really up to you to decide. Some people choose to recap their work experience, while others prefer to show off their personalities and include a quote or something more creative.

Check out the templates below for some inspiration.

Currently [role] at [company]. Formerly [past role] at [past company]. Interested in [2-3 personal interests]. Lets connect!

This is your standard one-size-fits-all LinkedIn summary. In a few sentences, youve outlined your current and past experience, as well as shared things that youre passionate about. This is the perfect template if you prefer to keep things short and sweet.

Known best for [major accomplishment]. A [role] at [company] looking to [career goal you wish to accomplish].

This template is ideal if you have any major accomplishments youd like to highlight. Although you have the opportunity to do this under your work experience further down on your profile, your summary is an easy way to showcase your greatest achievements front and center.

To use my gifts of [2-3 qualities or skills] to [overarching goal you seek to reach].

A personal mission statement defines who you are as a person and a professional. It outlines the things youre most passionate about and what values are most important to you. If you want to get more personal in your LinkedIn summary, this is the way to do it.

Im a [job position] at [company]. [1-2 sentence description about what your company does, its mission or goals]. [Any additional information about your company and its role in the market]. [Link to company website or careers hub].

Even if youre not looking to make a career move anytime soon, you still want to have a LinkedIn summary that is a strong reflection of who you are as a professional. With this option, you can highlight your current role and the company you work for, as well as advertise any job openings or upcoming events your organization is putting on.

The bulk of your LinkedIn profile will be made up of your experience. In this section, you are prompted to add current and past roles as well as short descriptions of your responsibilities at each position (the latter is optional).

1. Go to your profile by clicking the Me icon at the top of the page and select View Profile2. Scroll down until you see the Experience header and then click the big plus (+) sign3. In the pop-up, enter your company, job title, and other relevant details4. Click Save

Source: LinkedIn

Add any relevant and standout details related to your current and past positions. If you list any accomplishments in your summary, this is your opportunity to elaborate on them.

If youre on the hunt for a new gig, its a good idea to add your formal resume to your LinkedIn profile. Once its uploaded, it will show up at the bottom of the summary section.

1. On the homepage, select View Profile from the dropdown menu under the Me icon2. Click on the pencil icon to edit your profile3. In the pop-up, scroll down and click Upload under media4. Find your resume file and click Save

Source: LinkedIn

By uploading your resume, youre going the extra mile to show potential employers that youre eager to find a new position.

Skills and endorsements live at the very bottom of your LinkedIn profile. If you havent listed any skills on your page yet, this section will not appear on your profile.

Source: LinkedIn

To get started, follow these steps:1. Click the Me icon, followed by View Profile from the drop-down menu2. Select the blue Add profile section to the right side of your name3. Click Skills from the drop-down menu4. Type out which skills you want to add

Source: LinkedIn

Once you do this, a designated skills section will appear towards the bottom of your profile. You can always go back and add or remove skills by scrolling to this section.

Similar to a resume, you want to highlight your most marketable hard and soft skills on your LinkedIn profile. Dont be afraid to get specific when listing your skills this section is your opportunity to make your profile stand out.

These are technical skills that youve earned through education, certifications, or work experience.

Here are some examples of hard skills to list on your LinkedIn profile:

These skills are less related to your technical expertise and more related to your ability to collaborate and work with others. Soft skills are often more difficult to quantify.

Here are some examples of soft skills:

Organization

Be sure to list skills that are an accurate reflection of your abilities as a professional. To make your profile more credible, you can seek out endorsements from your LinkedIn connections. More on that later.

Your LinkedIn network is one the most powerful tools the platform has to offer. Your network is made up of connections or people who you have professional relationships with. This could be current or past coworkers, clients, and even mentors.

The more connections you have, the bigger your network is and the more opportunities you have to be noticed for job openings and show up in LinkedIn search results.

The first step toward growing your network is making connections. To connect with someone, follow these steps:

1. Click My Network at the top of your homepage. A list of possible connections will populate.2. Click on a persons profile that youd like to connect with3. Select Connect to the right of the persons name4. Fill out the pop-up box if you want to add a personal message with your connection request5. Click Done

Source: LinkedIn

Your connection request will be pending until its accepted by the person on the other end. If they accept, you will be notified of your new connection.

LinkedIn gives users the option to follow other users or brands. This is different than a connection in several ways. Using the follow feature allows you to see their posts and articles on your newsfeed, but they wont be able to see yours.

This is useful when following industry influencers that you may not know personally, but you still want to see their content.

One of the major benefits of growing your LinkedIn network is the ability to leverage your connections for endorsements. As previously mentioned, endorsements help boost your credibility since your peers are validating your skills.

A great way to start getting endorsements is by giving them, heres how:

1. Go to your connections profile by searching their name2. Scroll down to the Skills & Endorsements section3. Click the blue plus (+) sign to endorse a skill4. In the pop-up, select a skill level and how youre familiar with your connections skills

Source: LinkedIn

Its important to note that your connection will be notified of the endorsement and will have to accept it before it appears on their profile.

Just like any other social media network, LinkedIn is vulnerable to hosting users that misuse the platform outside of its intended purpose.

Its important to tread with caution and be aware of strangers that try to connect with you. If you suspect a user has bad intentions, it may be best to block them.

Follow these steps to learn how:

1. Go to the users profile2. Click More on the right side of their name3. From the drop-down menu, select Report/Block4. Click Block from the pop-up to confirm your decision

Source: LinkedIn

After a user is blocked, they will no longer be able to see your profile or contact you. If you change your mind down the line, you can always unblock the user.

When you first create your LinkedIn profile, you automatically get assigned a URL. Most of these auto-generated URLs look like a jumbled mix of letters and numbers.

Luckily, LinkedIn makes it easy for users to update and customize profile URLs.

1. Click Me at the top of your homepage, followed by View Profile2. In the top-right corner, select Edit public profile & URL3: Select the pencil icon and type out your desired URL4: Click Save

Source: LinkedIn

All LinkedIn profile URLs follow the same format. Your new URL will look like this: http://www.linkedin.com/in/custom-url-here.

One of LinkedIns less-known features allows users to publish long-form articles right on the platform. This is different than posting a status, which limits you to 1300 characters or less.

Follow these simple step-by-step instructions to post an article on LinkedIn:

1. At the top of your LinkedIn newsfeed, click Write an article on LinkedIn2. Write your article. Be sure to include a headline and any relevant images or videos3. Click Publish

Source: LinkedIn

Once you hit publish, the article will be shared with your network via the newsfeed. Users can like and leave comments on the piece.

The key to using LinkedIn effectively is knowing all of the platforms capabilities and leveraging them to your benefit. Creating a profile that is up-to-date is only scraping the surface of what LinkedIn can do for your career and professional brand.

Check out these tips to take your LinkedIn presence to the next level.

LinkedIn groups are online communities of people who share similar interests or experience. Joining a group is a great way to meet like-minded professionals in your industry, share knowledge, and expand your network.

You dont have to work in a creative industry to see value from adding pictures, videos, or other multimedia files to your summary. One of the easiest ways to make your experience stand out and highlight past projects youve worked on is by adding them directly to your profile.

Whether youre gearing up for an annual performance review or negotiating a final offer at a new company, its important to know your earning potential.

The LinkedIn Salary Insights tool offers wage information based on your role, location, company size, and how much other people in your role (or the position youre applying for) are earning.

Sending direct messages, or InMails, on LinkedIn is a low-pressure way to create deeper connections with your network. Always be sure to send a personalized InMail message if youre requesting to connect with someone outside of your primary network.

Additionally, remember to always keep things professional and format direct messages similar to a work email.

Keeping tabs on trending hashtags is a quick and effective way to stay in-the-know and share insights with others in your industry. To discover hashtags, enter the topic youd like to follow in the search bar. LinkedIn will populate your search results with hashtags that match your query.

LinkedIn is available at no cost; however, the platform does have a paid offering for users who want to unlock extra features and perks. Deciding which LinkedIn Premium plan is right for you will depend on what youre looking to get out of the platform. Popular paid features include access to analytics and a resume builder.

RELATED: If youre not ready to take the plunge into the full paid offering, LinkedIn offers a one-month free trial for users.

If there ever comes a time when you want to delete your LinkedIn account, its very simple to do.

1. Click the Me icon at the top of the homepage. In the drop-down menu, select Settings & Privacy2. Under the Account tab, scroll to Account Management and click Change3. Select a reason for deleting your account4. Enter your password and click Close Account

Source: LinkedIn

Once you close your account, it will be officially inactive and not visible to other users.

While the days of handing out business cards and filling out paper job applications may not be over just yet, more and more people are turning to digital platforms, such as LinkedIn, to job hunt, network, and build their professional brands.

With this guide in your back pocket, youll be a full-fledged LinkedIn guru in no time.

LinkedIn is far more than just a social media platform for job-seekers. Learn how businesses leverage LinkedIn as a marketing tool toadvertise job openings, attract qualified talent, and build brand awareness.

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How to Use LinkedIn: Must-Have Tips for Professional Success - G2

Sleepless creative nights have borne fruit - you have on your hands the first track with a cool name and a shimmering horizon of possibilities. And then you get stuck: what to do next? You just need to find a place to be on Apple Music, Spotify, etc. Do not be lazy, upload your music to streaming services, and spend some time on Apple Music promotion services. Indeed, at any moment you can be shazammed" and found - be available to your potential listener!

When it comes to promoting their work, musicians are often not very creative. As a rule, all that comes to their mind is to organize a concert. This is not bad, but you can do so much better, no need in old tricks. Various promoting services will help you to become popular on Apple Music.

Getting into the main top-chart is a real chance for you, as an artist, to announce the directors of major radio stations and television channels about your track, album or video. Being at the top of Apple Music, you attract the millionth audience to your track. Do you know that 50 million people have already issued a paid subscription to the music streaming service? This was announced by Apple's top manager Tim Cook.

The future lies in the services, so Apple spares no effort in promoting and improving Apple Music. Although its charm is not that you can endlessly listen to verses that are familiar to your music, but constantly find something new. In any case, people love Apple Music precisely for such things, the services will tell you what to listen to, because everyone gets tired of running the same familiar tracks. That`s where you enter the stage.

But what to do in your case? How to promote? After uploading a track to the Internet, its really worth trying one of the many services for Apple Music promotion. After that, the song will appear in tops, popular playlists, and recommendations. New subscribers will want to not only listen to your music but also follow your creative life. To fill their needs, create accounts in all key social networks and provide subscribers with products of your creativity. Find own group of people, who will be interested in your music, and try to promote your music through them. Roughly speaking, try to get into the format: in the black metal community, nobody will appreciate your romantic lyrics.

In the field of the dynamic development of the Apple Music service, it becomes the main chart of the country where are no paid places. Apple Music is the most incorruptible service, but help isn`t corruption, right? I am sure that there will always be a place for such talent as you are.

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Is there a Reason to use Promotion Tools on Apple Music? - The African Exponent