#connect the line means they’re all in this together so it’s like a trojan horse kinda thing

[akkivee]

i still say we should have a battle royale style drb with everyone fighting in the ring but i’m sure it’d be too difficult to make money off of that formula lmao

[astrochiron]

The Signs :: Channel Orange // Frank Ocean

Aries- Sweet Life

“You've had a landscaper and a house keeper since you were born The starshine always kept you warm”

This line refers to an easy life, one of luxury and means. What’s more, this person has had these things since birth, not even earning these things themselves. An Aries rising chart is called natural, as their houses are led by their associated signs, their life tends flows easily and this person has had a similar life.

“So why see the world, when you got the beach? Don't know why see the world, when you got the beach”

Aries is the sign of self and your own experiences that you don't have to reach out for. This person has trouble seeing outside of their world and, in fact, refuses to branch out. They have the “beach” in their own mind allowing them to ignore the things going on around them.

Overall

This song is a challenge to look outside of oneself and your own comforts to empathize and experience the ways of others. Frank wants her to step outside of her privilege and her pretty surroundings to maybe experience something else, something less curated for them. The lyrics imply a sense of immaturity exhibited by the subject, not fueled by the search of fun but by circumstance.

Taurus- Pink Matter

“That soft pink matter Cotton candy, Majin Buu, oh, oh, ohh Close my eyes and fall into you, you, you My God, she's giving me pleasure” close my eyes and fall into you” 

This line provides sensory imagery of softness and pleasure, two things Taurus is associated with. Cotton candy and Majin Buu (a DBZ character) conjuring up safe and comfortable imagery of childhood and happiness. Frank’s moved on to another source of pleasure though, as this line alludes to sex and the pleasure of it. Taurus is associated with the physical pleasure of sex.

“Pleasure over matter” 

Both pleasure and physical mater are associated with Taurus. Taurus is an Earth sign, associated with physical matters like money, possessions, and even your relationship with your physical body. Pleasure is the ultimate goal and that is bolstered by the maintenance of physical means.

Overall

This song’s focus on the body, especially the feminine one, links it to the feminine sign of Taurus. While Virgo is linked with physical health and routine, Taurus shows how we view and worship the body. This song also focuses on desire, another Taurean trope.

Gemini- Thinkin’ Bout You

“A tornado flew around my room before you came Excuse the mess it made, it usually doesn't rain in”

The chaos and air-related tornado is a perfect symbol for Gemini, a restless and powerful force made of fluent thought and free-ranging speech (Air related things). Frank is also lying to this guy, saying his room is messy because of a tornado. I’m not implying Gemini’s lie, but they certainly have fun with the truth more than most signs.

“Since you think I don't love you, I just thought you were cute That's why I kissed you”

This song displays the inquisitive and impulsive nature of Gemini. Frank kissed the guy because he thought he was cute, plain and simple, almost like school kids on the playground. This also displays the dismissal of romantic disinterest (common in the manner of most air signs) for inquisitiveness.

Overall

The title literally has “thinking” in it, which is Gemini’s superpower as the mutable air sign. The whole song is something of a train of thought ramble that Frank is well known for, honestly. The whole song has a childhood vibe, even supported by Frank saying this is about a time when he was 17 or so. Gemini is linked with our formative years and though, 17 is a bit old for Gemini’s range, it’s still cerebrally nostalgic and witty.

Cancer- Forest Gump

“Forrest Gump You run my mind, boy Running on my mind, boy Forrest Gump”

Cancers have a tendency to linger on thoughts, especially the emotional nature of them. I don't think Cancers are crybabies (I'd give that more to Pisces who cry from happiness, frustration and sadness all in the same hour), but they are very emotionally strong and emotionally stubborn. Their emotions are forefront in memory and so is the way Forest made Frank feel.

“Forrest green, Forrest blues I'm remembering you If this is love, I know it's true I won't forget you”

The “Forest blues” points toward Frank being in feelings over a past situation. Whether over something that happened when they were together or over the break-up itself, Frank is sad and a cancer will never forget how someone made them feel.

Overall

This song has a focus on past feelings for someone, not specific memories. Cancers are very subjective and, instead of remembering facts about a memory, they'd be remembering how they were feeling during the time. As a bonus, the song is  named after an older movie which was itself based in nostalgia.

Leo- Super Rich Kids

“Real love, I'm searching for a real love”

Leos are associated with romance and unconditional love. Their search for joy and the uninhibited feeling of childhood makes them crave and seek true love, sometimes at the detriment of their well being, but aways for the better in the end. No matter how unhealthy, these two searching for genuine love from one another, though finding temporary joy in drugs.

“Caddy-smashing, bratty ass He mad, he snatched his daddy's Jag And used that shit for batting practice”

Earl’s whole rap discusses the more self-destructive traits of Leo. This line in particular shows the sometimes self-centered nature, expressing their anger by inflicting pain on others. Leos are very expressive and, despite their genial nature, are still passionate fire signs. This also a very childish expression of emotion, and our inner-child is linked with this sign.

Overall

Immaturity is often a negative trait associated with fire signs. Leo’s exhibit this immaturity when they may make bad decisions trying to seek love and acceptance, as well as looking for fun and enjoyment in the wrong places. And while not outright said, the subjects of this song seem to blessed (or cursed) with the fame and fortune associated with Leo.

Virgo- Lost

“And I just wanna know Why you ain't been going to work Boss ain't working you like this He can't take care of you like this”

This line display’s Virgo’s focus on work and duty. It also exhibits their often gently direct nature. This is very much a line a Virgo would say to their out-of-work partner, “This place is a mess! And I just wanna know; why you ain’t been going to work?” Virgos also take great care of their partner, even to the extent of being servile at times. He’s taking care of her and giving her a job.

“Hand me my triple weight So I can weigh the work I got on your girl”

Frank’s weighing out his product, showing the minutiae of his drug life. The song could focus on all the stuff he could buy for her, selling all these drugs, or even getting high on them himself, but instead he discusses weighing it up and strapping it to her. Frank employs this girl as a drug mule, being her boss and her lover; providing her employment and care (6th house).

Overall

Frank shows Virgo’s tendency to get caught up in work and the money coming in as opposed to the things that can be done with the money. Frank is always selling to give himself and the girl a better life, every drug run aways being the last one, but never really being the last one. The woman shows Virgo’s dedication to their partner, disregarding their own safety or comfort for their love.

Libra- Pilot Jones

“You're the dealer and the stoner With the sweetest kiss I've ever known”

This line represents the dichotomy of the user and the supplier. She’s both the source of his addiction and she enjoys the outcome of the addiction herself. This shows’s Libras’s tendency to be all things to all people. The last part also points toward Libra’s geniality and tendency to cover up ills and pains with kisses and sweet words.

“But if I got a condo on a cloud Then I guess you can stay at my place”

Despite all the bad decisions and toxicity, Frank is sayin that if he’s in a good place, she will be too. If he gets a raise, she benefits; if he buys a cheesecake, she gets a slice, if not half. When Libra’s are happiest, they want their partner there too, even if their partner was the reason for their unhappiness sometimes.

Overall

This song equates drugs with love, a metaphor I'd definitely associate with Libra. They don't need to be in a relationship, don't get me wrong; but it feels good. Librans lacking in self-expression or happiness or even stimulation, may turn to relationships just out of habit, even if they’re not with a “good” partner or one that is ultimately good for them. Frank is laid back in this song, allowing her to guide his high and really the whole relationship, taking Libra’s laid back and often lax attitude.

Scorpio- Sierra Leone

Spendin' too much time alone (And I just ran outta Trojans) Horses gallop to her throne

We all know about Scorpio’s focus on sex and the intimate connection formed behind it. This includes the first part of this line, as Scorpios tend to have intense relationships, often most intense in solitude with partner. This obviously doesn't involve only sex, but the intimate moments shared between two lovers when by themselves. 

“And a new day will bring about the dawn And a new day will bring another crying babe into the world”

Scorpio is linked with self-transformation, and the imagery of the new day bringing the dawn paints the picture of the whole world being renewed, as well as specifically the characters of this song and their evolutions. The last part of this line points to the birth of the characters’ child. The ultimate rebirth and the ultimate result of Scorpio’s sex and alone time, is a birth itself.

Overall

This song discusses an alternate Frank that got a girl pregnant young. It focuses on how different he’d be and how his life would be. This hypothetical thought experiment is very a very Scorpio thing to me, analyzing “what ifs” and “might be’s”. This song also focuses on the transformation of the characters, especially Frank, from stupid teenaged lovers to responsible parents by the end.

Sagittarius- Monks

“Mosh pits and bare chest Stage diving sky diver Spray the crowd with cold water Now it's mosh pits and wet tits I think I need a cold shower”

This whole verse gives Sagittarian vibes. Sag is ruled by jovial and beneficially social Jupiter. Each line exudes freedom, fun and physical exploration. The parties, lewd behavior, and stimulating music would all be perfect for Sags huge energy and need for experiences.

“African girl speaks in English accent Likes to fuck boys in bands Likes to watch Westerns And ride me without the hands”

This song represents the foreign interests of Sagtttarius. They love accents and different cultures and foreign people (romantically as well as platonically). There’s actually a hodgepodge of cultures represented with the African girl and her English accent with an interest in rock or grunge bands who watches American western movies and an... expansive physical repertoire. 

Overall

This song chronicles a meeting with a groupie, which gives to Sag’s rockstar vibe. Traveling countries, writing songs, and positively affecting masses are all things that Sagittarius is interested in. The groupies, they also probably wouldn't mind. As for the title, a monk, as defined by Oxford is “a member of a religious community of men typically living under vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience.” While the latter art of this definition sounds more like a Capricorn, evolved Sag’s are very monk-like once they’ve found their cause and their moral path.

Capricorn- Pyramids

“We'll run to the future, shining like diamonds In a rocky world, rocky-rocky world Our skin like bronze and our hair like cashmere As we march to the rhythm on the palace floor”

This line represents Capricorns focus on the future. Frank aims to be decked in gems, sun kissed and confidently walking even in a rocky world. Like Capricorn, he aims to dominate his environment and get the best out of it to his own benefit. He’s focused on improving themself and being presented as prestigious and as a king.

“The way you say my name makes me feel like I'm that nigga but I'm still unemployed You say it's big but you take it, ride cowgirl”

Capricorn’s get off on respect. Capricorn is one of those signs that has a link to sex, but primarily because of the power of it. She says his name like he’s the best, she compliment’s his assets, even if they’re still not too big for her. Even though he’s unemployed, he's still the head of household while they’re having sex. This points toward Capricorn’s sense of joy coming from others’ good perceptions of them, even if it’s not the right one. He’s broke, he may not have the biggest penis, and he may not even be the only one, but she makes him feel like all of those things aren't true.

Overall

Though metaphorical, this song focuses on history and royalty. Cleopatra may have been a Capricorn by some calculations and her outright rule of an empire as woman would support that. She was intelligent and business-minded and well-known. This song also shows a shift in status typically associated with Saturn and Capricorn. Though Saturn typically brings slow-but-sure progression, if the lessons it presents us aren't learned from and taken into account, it can take us down as high as it would drive us up. The character in this song goes from queen Cleopatra to Cleopatra working weekends at the Pyramid. Both demand attention, beseech respect, and accumulate wealth, though society sees them so differently.

Aquarius- Bad Religion

“And you say "Allahu akbar" I told him, "Don't curse me" "Bo Bo, you need prayer" I guess it couldn't hurt me “If it brings me to my knees, it's a bad religion, ooh’

The “bad religion” here shows the Aquarian distrust of religion. The driver tries to bless him, but he isn't interested in spiritual intervention, even though he did mention demons earlier in the song. Aquarians aren’t necessarily interested in or focused on religion because of the typical outright devotion involved in it. It’s a turn off for Aquarians and Frank is associating this with the unrequited love he's experiences with his crush.

‘This unrequited love To me, it's nothin' but a one-man cult”

I have a long analysis behind this next statement that I’m willing to back up one day but: Aquarians are attracted to odd social constructs especially things like cults. Every Aquarian I know has expressed interest in cults, dictatorships, or supreme leadership in the New World Order. That being oddly said, this line points toward Frank seeing himself as a worshiper in one of those cults and he wants the hell out. 

Overall

In this song we see how Frank made his love for this person his God and having it unrequited either caused or further proved his own negative feelings toward the whole idea of devotion and love. Aquarians also aren’t known for expressing their feelings in a conventional sense. Instead of going to a therapist and having to discuss feeling or going to a confidant and having to burden a friend or expose yourself to them, Frank chose to make his taxi driver his shrink, since he’s paying him anyway.

Pisces- Crack Rock

“You don't know how little you matter until you're all alone In the middle of Arkansas with a little rock left in that glass dick”

I’ve noticed that Pisceans have a bit of an inferiority-complex. This is typically portrayed a martyrdom but can even be expressed as. complete feeling of inadequacy and ineffectuality. This is due to their more tendency to outwardly exude peace even if they are in distress. This line also explicitly mentions crack, an extremely addictive substance. Pisces does have a link to addictions, though crack is bit extreme. We could replace crack with any momentarily-good but terminally-bad thing like constant sex, alcohol, less deleterious drugs, or even sleep and food. 

“Don't no one hear a sound Don't no one disturb the peace for riot Don't no one disrupt nirvana Don't no one wanna blow the high”

This line points out how Pisces tends to zone out and escape, especially when the world is a bit too much. Sleep is a common one, as Pisceans tend to have amazing dreams that likely beat a shitty or stressful life/situation. Nirvana, the ultimate escape, is associated with Pisces. They’re constantly trying (whether purposefully or subconsciously) to connect with the Great Other or the Universe or God. Anything blowing their high or disturbing their nirvana is cut off.

Overall

Frank said that he sung this song so it would sound like a smoker singing it. He wanted the fractured breath to show a long past and pain, as well as the self-abuse often an unintentional result of substance abuse. “Crack Rock” could also speak of a physical crack in a rock, separating from himself from the ones he loves due to the addiction. Isolation is common theme for Pisces.

check your moon sign (for the song that makes you comfortable and puts you in your emotions), sun sign (the song that makes you happy and the one you ride around to) and venus sign (the one that speaks to your inner artist).

[aion-rsa]

Edgar Wright Brings the Sparks Brothers Story to the Mainstream in New Documentary

https://ift.tt/3j138d8

With the advent of the internet, it’s become easier for musicians to infiltrate the mainstream. That band you loved when you were in high school but no one else in town heard of? You know, the one that was your hidden secret only shared with your closest friends? Now you can give out a streaming link to their music or get their permission to use that song you love on YouTube. Everyone knows them. Especially if they’ve been recording since 1970, had 25 studio albums, and are still playing to this day. So how come you probably don’t know about Sparks? Filmmaker Edgar Wright certainly wonders why.

The seemingly mysterious brothers Ronald and Russell Mael have been riding the waves of the popular music scene, receiving critical praise every decade, but still have somehow stayed under the pop culture radar. Wright, the director behind classics like Shaun of the Dead and Scott Pilgrim vs. the World, wants to change that.

With his new documentary, The Sparks Brothers, which is having its premiere at the 2021 Sundance Film Festival, Wright shines a light on the entire career of the brilliant world of Ron and Russ Mael. This includes work on their new musical Annette, which stars Adam Driver and Marion Cotillard, and is directed by Leos Catax. We had the opportunity to sit down with Ron, Russ, and Edgar to discuss just what makes the story of Sparks, so special. 

Was there a relationship between Edgar Wright and Sparks before this project started?

Edgar Wright: I had been a fan for a long time. Before making the documentary, Sparks was so enigmatic that I wasn’t really sure where they lived or whether they were from planet Earth. But then one day, I think it was in 2015, I was in Los Angeles writing Baby Driver in an office on the lot in West Hollywood, and my friend Michael Bacall[co-writer of Scott Pilgrim vs. the World] was in the office with me, and we were talking about Sparks.

I’d become by this point, as a lot of Spark fans are, like a full-on evangelist. Like if you’re talking about music, at some point I’d turn the conversation around to Sparks. And [Bacall] knew one Sparks song, “All You Ever Think About is Sex.” So I said, “Oh wow, listen to this.” So we ended up listening to a ton of albums. Then I thought, “I wonder if Sparks are on Twitter?” So I found a Sparks account and then I saw, “Sparks follows you,” and I was like, “Oh my God!”

So I followed them back, but I wasn’t already following them, so clearly not that big a Sparks fan. [Laughs] By fault I messaged them and said, “Hey I’m like a really big fan I saw you following me. Is this really the band?” Then Russell replied and said, “Yeah, this is Russell.” And I said, “Oh, usually bands have a PR person who runs their account.” And he said, “Not us.” So the funny thing is after having known and loved this band for decades, it’s just a funny thing I’m talking to them, and they’re also like only 20 minutes drive away from me. 

Within 24 hours, I was having breakfast at Russell’s house with Ron and Russell, and that’s when we met for the first time. I think at that breakfast you told me about Annette. Maybe it was in kind of in the works. When we first met there wasn’t any sort of talk of a project necessarily; I was just meeting them as a fan.

But then, I saw them live a couple of times and I sort of got it into my head that the thing that was stopping Sparks from being as big as they should be, was there was no overview. It started to kind of annoy me as I watched documentaries, and sometimes I felt like, “But, why isn’t there a documentary about Sparks?” And I said this enough times to enough people that it kind of came to a head at a Sparks gig in 2017 where I was standing in the VIP balcony.

Me and Phil Lord had gone to see Sparks together. And I said the same thing to Phil. I said, “You know what, Sparks really need a documentary about them. I think that would really push them over the edge. You could tell the context of them and explain to people how they were sort of the originators of most of these genres.”

And Phil said, “You should make the movie!” And I was like, “Ah,okay, I will!” So then I mentioned it to Ron and Russell after the gig, and as soon as I said it out loud that I want to do a documentary about you guys–it’s not something that you can promise and then take back. So here we are in 2021 with the finished film.

Ron Mael: Before meeting Edgar, we were huge fans of his films. So it wasn’t like we had to Google “Edgar Wright” to find out who this guy was that was coming to breakfast the next morning. So it was just an easy relationship to further. It just worked out so well because it’s a mutual admiration society.

Russ Mael: To embark on a documentary, you really have to have a dedication and a focus, and just stamina to do a project like this. In a certain way it’s a little different even than a feature film where there’s no parameters. The story can continue forever, sort of. Where do you stop, where do you start? It’s kind of this nebulous amount of material, a vast amount of material, and there’s no real ground rules.

To be able to hone in all of those things about a band with a 25-album history and then entertain on something as vast an array of a subject matter as that[is tough]. You have to have that real focus and stamina to want to do that. So we were really ecstatic when it was Edgar, who’s not only our friend but to be doing this film, which we thought could be something amazing, and it is. We’re just just ecstatic with the results. 

Edgar, you want to introduce Sparks further into the mainstream, but very early on in the film, Ron and Russ mention that maybe they’re a little worried about having people know too much about you. As the process went along, was it easier just to let out all these stories?

Russ: Initially we discussed with Edgar that part of the appeal we think for people that are really aware of the band is that there isn’t that much personal information out there, or that that everything that that they know about the band is via our music and via the image they have of the band via the album covers and seeing us on TV.

To unveil too much of that information that is more personal stuff, the question was, “Does that lessen the aura that people might think of the band having?” It was discussed what would be a good kind of division. How much you should share with the public and how much can still be held back from revealing. We think there was a really good separation in the amount of what was said and what was not said about the band.

Edgar: I just want to say I think all of those things just add to the legend… Because the music is just so imaginative and far reaching, seeing the more normal things about you–as a fan–I find that even more impressive. It doesn’t go the other way where it’s like, “Oh that boring.” It’s more along the lines of “my God, this is where all of this came from? These guys?” I find that mind blowing. 

Ron: I mean it’s not all that damaging to our image to be seen in football uniforms [in high school] you know. [Laughs] So it just kind of adds to the incongruity of the whole situation.

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Edgar, you’ve called your films Trojan Horses. You bring people in, thinking it will be one thing and then it turned out to be something else. For Ron and Russ, does it almost feel like you’re tricking people in the same way? You present this beat that people can dance to, but then you listen to the lyrics and all of a sudden this whole new level.

Russ: That was one of the things that we were really happy with in the documentary, that the lyrics were treated as a really big portion of the film. Not many documentaries that deal with pop bands will do that. We were really happy that the lyrics were seen as having big importance within the film. It’s not only discussing the music or the image of the band. We don’t see too many documentaries where they actually speak specifically about lyrics within songs.

Having someone like Neil Gaiman talking about the lyrics of Sparks or even Flea waxing so eloquently about Sparks lyrics was really important for us that that side was treated so well within the film. I think that that makes it so much richer than just discussing the music. We don’t know of many documentaries that really have delved that deeply into the lyrical side of bands.

You also covered so much. There’s only two albums that were not covered in their entirety in the film.

Edgar: I think that things like [the album] The Seduction of Ingmar Bergman, we didn’t have time to get into. I think we do cover all of them, because I feel like it was something where it became a thing that once you’d started doing this, it has to be that comprehensive. You see this with recent documentaries. I really liked, for example, the Bee Gees documentary, however I was kind of a bit bummed when they didn’t cover the Sergeant Pepper movie, at all. I was like, “Ah, I want to hear that story!”

In a way, with Sparks it was something where the misses are as interesting as the hits. And the reasons things don’t connect, that’s an important part of the story. You can’t have the ups without the downs. Most music documentaries are like, “Hey we’re the Beatles and we’re flying high and then we split up.” Like the Rolling Stones documentary goes up to the start of the ‘70s and then just stops [Laughs]. With Sparks, you have to, you have to draw the whole graph, and the downs, the misses are as important as the heights, and also some of the best stories.

So once we had started doing it, it was a case where I can’t just skip over something, I have to tell the whole story. When you get the opportunity to do it as a fan it’s like, I can’t not tell the whole story, and I’d be kicking myself if there was something that was missed and people said I wanted to hear about Introducing Sparks. But we cover it, so it’s ok.

I hate putting genre labels on stuff, I hate boxing things in, but if anybody talks about Sparks music, it’s always going to be Pop or it’s going to be Synth Pop. Do you feel that your music kind of gets mislabeled here and there? 

Ron: Well, whenever it is labeled, I think it’s mislabeled in a certain sense. We’re really happy about the documentary covering all those periods, so we aren’t just that glam rock band Sparks. It’s much, much more than that. Through all those periods, we never label ourselves as any of those things. It’s always been other people. I mean no offense to journalists, but journalists have to kind of find a slot for you and we always felt that we were in a certain way, operating outside of all of those things.

It just seems to minimize the music when you put those kind of labels on anything. Whether it’s self serving or something else, we felt our music was more important and timeless in a certain sense than that.

That also goes back to the point that there are misses here and there, but it seems that you guys had the availability to do what you wanted to do, pretty much your whole career. Nobody ever said, “You can’t do that.”

Russ: That’s the one thing that we’re still proud of. We’re not masochists and we obviously enjoy having commercial success when it comes around, but when it does come around, it’s not been us doing something different than we’ve always done; it’s just been the circumstances surrounding it that have made certain albums or songs become more visible.

That vision that was there from day one and when Todd Rundgren first took a stab at Sparks… [he was] the only person that took a chance on Sparks. In the beginning, the sensibility that we had then is the same sensibility that we have now, and we would never want to water down that sensibility in search of something that may be more widespread commercially. It would probably fail anyway, if we even had the ability to figure out what that is that’s commercial. Especially nowadays where everything is so fractured in the whole music area.

No one knows what that surefire thing is. That feeling that maybe if you do that kind of music and you’re going to be huge on Tik Tok or that sort of thing. So we’re just proud that we’ve stuck to our vision, and people have congregated towards it at various times in bigger ways than the other. But now in the end, we’re just happy that what we’re doing [what] feels as vital as it did from day one.

Edgar, music plays such a large part in your films, but we haven’t heard any Sparks music in your films yet. Will Last Night in Soho feature some Spark songs?

Edgar: No [Laughs]. I will say there was one time I tried to use a Sparks song in one of my films. I tried to use “This Town Ain’t Big Enough for Both of Us” in Hot Fuzz. But here’s the thing, and this is a credit to Ron and Russell, their music is not easy to use as wallpaper audio, because it’s so vivid, not just in terms of the songs but the lyrics are so evocative.

You can’t just have Sparks in the background, not easily. So I tried it and it didn’t quite work. It would have been better in a Baby Driver style, where I design the scene to go with the song, but I was trying it after the fact.

There were bits that were great but… I remember putting on the scene, it was actually in the scene where Simon Pegg is fighting Timothy Dalton in the model village, “This Town Ain’t Big Enough for Both of Us.” However, there was a point where, as a fan, I’d be watching the scene and I’d start listening to the song [and think] maybe that doesn’t work? Because now I’m distracted by the song in a given way. So I think that’s the thing, I haven’t used [a Sparks song] yet but I would say that’s because Sparks can’t just be on in the background.

Ron: One reason why there aren’t a lot of cover songs of Sparks is because other musicians hear them and they think that version is so stylistically entwined with the song itself, just the way that it actually is done that there is no way for them to do an alternate interpretation of it.

Edgar: You’ve done some of the best Sparks covers yourself. Some of the songs on Plagiarism, there’s a couple of them that are better than the original. Maybe ”Pulling Rabbits Out of a Hat” and “Change,” I think those are superior to the original version.

We will also soon see your feature film Annette. I know you had the issue with not being able to get your other film off the ground, back in the ‘80s with Tim Burton. But is it a case of actually being happier that you can have a project like this come out now, with the availability of social media and star power can help bring a bigger notice to it?

Russell: Well, we’re happy that in the end, it’s going to be happening; the release of Annette and having two films this year. I mean, having a documentary by Edgar Wright, that would have been enough. But having the other film that we’ve worked on for eight years finally see the light of day, and potentially be of interest to a lot of people with Adam Driver and Marion Cotillard and directed by Leos Carax… having those elements kind took on another level from when we first had written and first envisioned it eight years ago when it was potentially going to be just the next Sparks album.

Then it took on a whole new life as a movie and then it escalated once Adam got involved. In a way, just having it happen now, maybe it’s part of the whole saga of Sparks? It never rains, but it pours. That’s going to be the situation for 2021. Now we have two films, who would have thought?

Edgar: It’s not too late for Tim Burton to go into production on Mai, The Psychic Girl in 2021 as well. 

Russ: That’s right!

Edgar: Then you get the hat trick.

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[tefltraininginstitute]

Green Issues In ELT (with Ceri Jones)

Ceri Jones from ELT Footprint joins me to talk about green issues in language teaching. What does the environment have to do with teaching English? Is climate change too much of a hot topic (!) for the language classroom? What can teachers do to weave the environment into their lessons? Special thanks to Charlotte Giller this week for suggesting this topic and Ceri as a guest.

Green Issues in ELT (with Ceri Jones)

Ross Thorburn:  Hi everyone. Welcome back to "TEFL Training Institute" podcast. I'm Ross Thorburn. This week we are talking about green issues in ELT. To help us do that we have Ceri Jones, one of the founding members of ELT Footprint. Ceri is also a teacher, a course‑book writer, a teacher trainer, and sometimes co‑host of the "TEFL Commute" podcast.

In this episode, I ask Ceri about what does the environment basically have to do with language teaching? What can teachers do to bring environmental issues into the classroom and raise student awareness of issues with the environment? Finally, how can teachers help to make their classrooms more environmentally friendly? Enjoy the interview.

Ross:  Hi, Ceri, thanks for joining us. Can we just start off with, what does the environment have to do with language teaching?

Ceri Jones:  I think there are two ways coming at it. One is the individuals who are involved. The teachers themselves as people may be particularly interested in environmental issues. Really the last year, 2019 seemed to be this huge year of mass consciousness where global strikes led by Fridays For Future, for example, gave the issue a massively high profile.

There's even things like from a language point of view into the word of the year last year for Oxford University Press's dictionary was climate emergency. The graph that shows the growth and frequency of the use of the term is amazing. It's this huge upward curve from a general educational point of view.

We're not talking about English language teaching, particularly here but education on the whole. It's also coming into school curricula across the world. The inclusion of environmental studies and what you could call eco‑literacy. Italy has made it compulsory across primary and lower secondary school coming out in what the Italian Minister for Education called the Trojan‑horse approach.

Not that they study it as a subject, but that it is across the curriculum. You can see it then in things like the PISA testing criteria have also included environmental awareness. In Australia, they have built a really interesting framework for further education and beyond. They have all these categories of eco‑literacy which echo the CFR for language for example.

You'd have a level one, a level two, or level three awareness or, what they expect kids to be able to do. I think one of the things that chimes with ELT teachers is there's an emphasis on critical thinking, information literacy, being able to differentiate bias and fact and fact‑checking in general.

Fact‑checking within the whole environmental issue is actually something that's a fantastic way of bringing the two things together in class and with teenagers, for example, by looking at what is a green issue.

Ross:  You mentioned, they're bringing this topic into class. What would you say to teachers who perhaps feel a bit unsure about imposing this topic on their students? Maybe for teachers who feel that this is a topic that's best left for science teachers or geography teachers to deal with?

Ceri:  Yes, and I think it is a very valid complaint about topic fatigue. "We're always doing this in school. We don't want to do this. It's boring." I would say the thing is that because it's in the curriculum, it's also in the exams. As teachers preparing our students for that, and also for an English speaking community beyond exams in the classroom, this is a big trending topic.

We need to prepare them to be able to deal with it. From a point of view of lexis, for example, they need to be able to deal with texts on this topic. Otherwise, they're not going to be able to function maybe in an exam where one of the reading texts is on this topic.

Just as you need to teach students the vocabulary or for example technology, because it's everywhere around us, you would not teach about technology. In the same way you would not teach about the environment. You're doing your students a disservice if you don't. That would be my call out to teachers who reject the idea as being maybe too political. That might be a fear that some teachers have.

Ross:  In terms of it being too political then, what can teachers do about that? I mean, I think you can picture almost like a graph of interesting topics along with how controversial they are. It's probably a straight diagonal line, isn't it? The more controversial the topic, the more interest it can create.

Clearly teachers here need to walk a fine line where they don't want to either upset their students or their school management, or even more worryingly, maybe perhaps the governments in the countries that they're working in?

Ceri:  Absolutely, and as you say, it's like if there's no controversy, there's no interest at all, is that there has to be something which piques interest. Kind of like the motivation curve, you have to hit that perfect spot at the top of the curve where there's enough motivation, not too much. It's the same thing with interest. There's enough interest but not too much for it to become personal or heated or problematic.

I was talking to a teacher who's working in Brazil. In one of his classes, he was working with adults who were older than him. They were climate‑deniers in his class. He wanted to talk about the environment with them. They found common ground that they could agree on, which was conservation.

Even if they didn't believe the science of climate change, they were very interested in and felt strongly about the needs to conserve. At the time, there was an oil spill off the coast. They were very concerned there about the turtle population, for example. They had lots of ideas about how the government should be protecting the natural environment.

He said, "Well, OK, I thought that was a way in. You can find a common ground or maybe a local issue, or something that people do feel positively about." I think that's quite an important thing. What we really need to emphasize as much as we can, the positive and the local and things that can be done. Bringing negativity into the classroom, it's a real downer educationally I think.

There's a danger that we're just going to switch students off completely. That effective filter, it can inhibit people learning. All of the connections that you might be making with the language and the subject and that reacting, kind of emotively even to your learning, all of that will be switched off. That means that you're short‑circuiting the learning experience.

I like to look at it from a point of view of narrative, of positive stories, of individual action, of change, that can be brought about by individuals, whilst at the same time obviously not ignoring the big picture, but trying to make it something which does have a positive and more optimistic side to it, I guess.

Ross:  Do you want to tell us more about those local topics? How teachers and schools can make them maybe a little bit experiential so hopefully students are involved in these rather than just reading about them?

Ceri:  One of the easy topics is recycling and consumption. On a school level, a school can choose to start their own internal recycling system, get these kids involved. A local school had the children actually building the recycling bins. Then there were recycling monitors, who every week would be the ones who would take the recycling from their bins and take them to the municipal bins.

They were learning about the system, just waste management in general. Basically, they were learning about how much waste they were generating. At the same time, they were making suggestions for how to produce less. For example, plastic waste like, "OK, well, how else could you bring your sandwiches to school instead of wrapping them up in foil," which is a typical Spanish way of bringing a sandwich to school?

You could just bring it in in a plastic Tupperware and reuse that. Plastic is fine if you're reusing it, looking after it. Beeswax wraps, but then there was this idea of, "Well, actually we're just going back to what we used to do." Then children interviewing their grandparents about what they used to do.

At the same time in Spain, there was a campaign which was a week without plastic like this challenge, "Can you shop for a week without buying any plastic at all?" For example, with one of my classes, I just went to the supermarket and took loads of photos of stuff wrapped in plastic, loads of photos of stuff, not wrapped in plastic. We just talked about what was in plastic, what wasn't.

Then the kids did the same thing. They went into local supermarkets with their phones and took photos and brought those into class. It just became a class project.

Ross:  Great examples there. I think the big advantage of talking about a local river or beach or park, is that it's generally quite a safe entry‑point into these topics. Obviously, as soon as you bring up what government should be doing on a national or international level, then that's when the topic becomes political and becomes a bit more dangerous, I suppose.

Ceri:  Yes, I think cleanup campaigns as well those as you say, like an apolitical or cross party or whatever you want to say, it's just local interest. It's looking after your local patch. Things like I live in a beach town, so the beach cleanups, those are perfect. It's that thing of chiming in with the students realities, which is what we do anyway.

With any topic we always try and tie it in with our students experiences and their lives and their contexts. It's exactly the same with environmental issues.

Ross:  Ceri, I also wanted to ask you about teachers practices here. It seems to me really important that if a teacher is going to be getting their students to learn about the dangers of climate change, they don't want to do that by getting students to read information about climate change on one‑sided color photocopies...

[laughs]

Ross:  ...because obviously, by doing that you are contributing to climate change. What can teachers do to make sure that they're practicing what they preach that as well as informing students about the dangers of climate change? They are making sure that the way that they teach and how they run their classroom is more environmentally friendly.

Ceri:  Photocopies are an obvious an easy target. Teachers are pretty good at cutting back on photocopies and have been doing so for quite some time. It's not only from a paper point of view, it's also from a financial point of view in a lot of schools. Also, as a teacher trainer, there's that idea of teaching our teachers to make the most of the activities they have are not to be so reliant on handouts and bits of paper.

They're actually not necessary. Most of what you do, you can do without the photocopies, and things like reusing, having mini whiteboards if the material you want is something that's only going to be used in that moment. If it's something that you're going to use over and over and over. Then invest in even laminating. It's plastic, but it's plastic that's going to be reused over and over and over.

If it's worth it, then you make it, you keep it and you reuse it. It can be very liberating for teachers to be told you don't have to make copies. I can remember years ago as a teacher being told, "Oh no, give them something to take home. They need a piece of paper in their hand. Otherwise, they won't feel they've done anything in the lesson."

We can emphasize more helping our students to learn to take better notes, to be more responsible for chronicling their lessons. That's one side, is the photocopying. Having a little recycling corner in the classroom is another nice idea, just even if it's just for paper. Maybe even raising awareness of things, like chopping receipts, for example, can't be recycled, because they're heat‑treated, and they're full of chemicals.

They have to be thrown into the general rubbish. That's you say what can do. We can only put paper into the recycling bin that can actually be recycled. If it's soiled from food, sorry, can't recycle it. There's little lessons that students can learn through a teacher just running a very simple recycling bin in the corner of the class.

Again, with younger learners, swapping from pens to pencils, so that the writing material that's in the class is all pencils. They get the students to write their names on their pencil and see how long their pencil lasts. They have like a competition whose pencil lasts longest. Just little things like that, which are awakening and awareness of consumption.

There's lots of ways that a teacher can very subtly influence their young learners, inducing them into this whole culture of awareness that a lot of stuff around us is single‑use and doesn't need to be.

Ross:  Ceri, thank you so much for joining us. Where would you like teachers to go to find more information?

Ceri:  Lovely, if you could give a little plug to the ELT footprint Facebook group, that would be fantastic. There's the blog, which has a section on materials which has lots of links and ideas and resources for teachers who want to start exploring using environment topics in the classroom. We're also on Twitter. We're also on LinkedIn. You need to look for ELT Footprints, and all of those should pop up.

Ross:  Brilliant, thank you very much for joining us, Ceri. Thank you all very much for listening. We'll see you again next time. Goodbye.

[techcrunchappcom]

New Post has been published on https://techcrunchapp.com/10-cybersecurity-myths-you-need-to-stop-believing/

10 cybersecurity myths you need to stop believing

These are the top cybersecurity myths you need to let go of. (iStock)

On the Dark Web, you can purchase cybercrime “how-to kits” that gather lists of breached names, account numbers, passwords, and even telephone support lines for the victims to call. It’s not difficult to get on the Dark Web. Tap or click here for my short guide that tells you how to access the Dark Web.

Make no mistake. Just because you’re on the Dark Web doesn’t mean you’re anonymous. Tap or click here for a video that shows how the FBI works the Dark Web.

Ransomware attacks, data breaches, and scams — along with a steady stream of extortion and phishing emails — have taken over the internet. We hear about cybercrime so often that it can quickly turn into white noise. That’s a mistake.

Here are 10 security myths you need to stop believing about your data.

1. I don’t have anything worth protecting

You might think your data isn’t worth anything. You might think because you’re broke, no one cares about your data. You might also think that since you have nothing to hide, there’s no point in protecting your identity or information.

Think about it this way: All those free social media apps you sign up for — Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest, Snapchat — aren’t free at all. When you sign the Terms and Conditions, you’re signing away your right to privacy, which lets the apps build a detailed demographic profile of you.

The companies turn around and sell this information to marketers; that means your information is making these companies millions of dollars. So why wouldn’t hackers want to cash in on that?

2. I use security software, so I’m fine

Many people think that security software will act as an invincible shield between their data and hackers. A group of Russian hackers breached servers of three major antivirus providers. Now, all the information they stole is up for sale on the Dark Web

So, what’s an excellent way to work around this danger? Keep your operating system software and security software updated. Do the same for your other devices, including your phone and tablet.

Don’t forget about your router. Once hackers break into that, every device using it to connect to the internet is vulnerable. Tap or click here for a free test to see your router has already been hacked.

Finally, make sure you’re using the right security software. Tap or click here for 5 free cybersecurity tools you can download today.

3. With all these data breaches, I have nothing left to protect

Want to see if your data has already been breached? One website has been tracking data breaches for years and put a handy search tool online. You simply enter your email address and get a yes or no answer. Tap or click here to see if your data has been compromised.

Let’s say you’re on the list. You may feel hopeless, and like there’s no point in protecting your data since it’s already been overtaken.

That’s not true. There are different types of data breaches that can have different impacts. For example, say your password and username to your bank account have been breached. Don’t give up — inaction empowers the hackers to pry for even more information, which could lead them to your Social Security number.

4. Phishing scams are easy to spot

Phishing scams are becoming more sophisticated as hackers infiltrate companies, CEO’s personal accounts, and even government agencies. Phishing scams have skyrocketed during COVID-19.

Very realistic looking extortion scams are making the rounds. The subject contains your email address and a password that looks familiar. The scammer says unless you pay up, they will release the video of you that they took using your webcam when you visited a porn site.

Don’t buy it. The scammer got your email address and password from a data breach. If you are still using the combination of both, it’s best to change your password at the very least.

It’s not always as simple as an unfamiliar account reaching out to you with bizarre messages trying to get you to click on a link. Sometimes, they use familiar faces against you, which leads to the next myth.

5. My friends on social media won’t hurt me

The great thing about social media is that it connects you with your friends and relatives. Unfortunately, the web of connectivity can be an opening for spiders to turn friends into gateways for data breaches.

Say your friend has a weak password, and their account gets breached. Say they send you a private message saying they found a funny new video or a cool new site you should check out. Since the link is coming from a familiar face, your guard may be down. After all, you’re aware of phishing scams when you get a message from someone you’ve never heard of, but you don’t have that on your mind when you hear from a friend.

Hackers bank on those lowered guards to corrupt your web and turn it into a jumping point for even more data breaches.

6. Hackers are mysterious, scary figures

When you think of a hacker, you probably imagine popular images of hooded figures hunched over a computer. A lot of hackers are regular people and can be hard to spot.

It’s important to realize that hackers aren’t lone wolves. There are entire organizations — some government-funded — that work together to infiltrate data and rake in millions. Hacking is also a popular way for mobsters to bring in cash at long distances.

Once you realize just how dire this threat is, it becomes easy to understand why it is so important to take steps towards cybersecurity.

To stay on top of the latest hacker threats, get my breaking tech news alerts. You’ll only get an alert when threats strike. Tap or click here to sign up now.

7. I only go to mainstream sites, so I don’t need security software

You need security software no matter where you go. Remember what I said earlier, about how social media apps sell your data to make their money? The more cookies you have in your browser, the more your every step is being followed.

When multiple sites have a detailed profile of you, that increases your chances of getting your data breached, since all companies are vulnerable to a data breach. Security software keeps you safe. It’s like two-factor authentication: a necessary step towards protecting your privacy.

RELATED: 3 security programs that should be on every computer and laptop

8. I use complex passwords

Even a long, complicated password isn’t enough to keep you safe in today’s security landscape.

Nowadays, there are speedy programs people use to run billions of password combinations — and it only takes a second to run these potential passwords. Not only that, but hackers have sophisticated methods for identifying passwords we use in password creation.

That’s why you should also use password managers as well as two-factor authentication.

9. I know a fake voice when I hear one

You’ve probably heard that scammers will call you with robotic voices, pretending to be the IRS. They demand money. Maybe you’ve gotten one of these calls yourself. You may think you can recognize a robotic voice, but unfortunately, robocallers are improving their techniques.

Deepfake technology can replicate more than just faces. It’s also expanding into voices. Online programs need only to hear your voice to create a close copy.

10. I will know when something bad gets in my device or computer

Cybercriminals’ work is stealth. When they’re doing their deeds, there’s no red flag that pops up. They have intricate ways of infiltrating your data; there could even be Trojan horses in the form of viruses lurking in your code right now.

Now that you’re aware of the 10 most common cybersecurity myths, you’re better equipped to recognize misinformation spread by hackers who want to keep you vulnerable.

Remember, your data is worth a lot to cybercriminals, so take steps to protect it. Make sure all of your gadgets are up to date with all the security patches needed to fend off online attacks.

Make use of robust security software, password managers, and two-factor authentication. Most of all, follow news on recent breaches and hacking trends to keep your security tools reliable and timely.

On my website, we have a busy Q&A forum where you can post your tech questions and get answers you can trust from real tech pros, including me. Check it out here and let us solve your tech issues.

Call Kim’s national radio show and tap or click here to find it on your local radio station. You can listen to or watch The Kim Komando Show on your phone, tablet, television or computer. Or tap or click here for Kim’s free podcasts.

Copyright 2020, WestStar Multimedia Entertainment. All rights reserved.

Learn about all the latest technology on The Kim Komando Show, the nation’s largest weekend radio talk show. Kim takes calls and dispenses advice on today’s digital lifestyle, from smartphones and tablets to online privacy and data hacks. For her daily tips, free newsletters and more, visit her website at Komando.com.

[crapfutures]

The wolf at the door (domestication of technology, part 1)

One of the enduring objects used to represent the technological future is the robot. This legacy means that its promise has the ability to evolve in accordance with our societal and cultural dreams and aspirations. It can reflect the current state of technological development, our hopes for that technology as well as our fears. Fundamentally though, after almost a century of media depictions and corporate promises, robots are yet to enter our homes and lives in any meaningful way. Or at least not in the way we expected.

If we’re going to talk about robots we should begin with a definition. But this is by no means an easy task. Robot does not refer to one specific object; it is not based on a singular technology, context, or function; and while certain stereotypical (e.g. anthropomorphic) robot forms pervade, other diverse and surprising configurations of technology can also be considered a robot. The robot can exist simultaneously in multiple contexts and planes of reality, and for a multitude of reasons: as a functional engineered machine operating autonomously on a production line (such as an industrial robot); as a corporate vision of the future (humanoid robot); as a complex construct of fiction (android); or as a high-street product (robotic vacuum cleaner). While the promiscuity of the generic concept often leads to a blurring of these worlds and indeed the promise of migration between them, the actual artefact is very poor at making this transition - the spectacular robots of our technological dreams are yet to make it into our everyday lives.

With such a broad range of possibilities the definition must be quite vague. But for the purposes of this discussion it could be as follows:

For a thing to be considered a ‘robot’ it should be able to sense and interpret in some fashion its environment, compute decisions based on that sensory information, and then act on those decisions in some way.

This statement is satisfying from a technical perspective, but its dryness fails to reflect the mythical or emotive factor commonly associated with robots. Therefore to the technical definition we will add:

The complexity or sublimity of either the sensing, computing or mechanics should elevate the status of the robot above that normally ascribed to machines or products.

The dream of robot servants, as with so many technological dreams, is centuries old. In the 1890s Oscar Wilde talked about the need for mechanical slaves in his manifesto for fully automated luxury socialism. At the 1939 New York World’s Fair, the Westinghouse Electric Corporation gave the dream a physical form with Electro, a giant metal walking and talking robotic man. While not the first humanoid robot, Electro was important for pushing forward the idea that robots could enter the home as domestic help.

The promise of this particular type of robot future persists to this day, exemplified by corporate robots such as Honda’s ASIMO and the vast number of similar objects emerging out of academic and corporate research. But while such robots have become commonplace in production lines, tech fairs and research laboratories, their presence is yet to be accommodated in the domestic sphere. Robots continued to hover at the threshold as unwelcome guests, our resistance to strangers seemingly too strong to overcome. Bringing a full-sized humanoid robot into the domestic sphere would be like bringing a wolf through the door. Instead, like the gradual domestication of the wolf, it is happening little by little, in gradual steps, by the process of future nudge. New types of robots are entering millions of homes with the introduction and growing ubiquity of AI-based virtual assistants. Not in our homes, obviously - we’re not called Crap Futures for nothing. But a lot of people actively welcomed these devices into their daily lives.

The key word to describe these new robots is adaptation. Embedding virtual assistants in phones and watches blurred the lines from the start. These familiar everyday objects - rather than creepy humanoid forms - acted as the Trojan horse, and succeeded in bringing robots into the domestic sphere. This had been done to some extent before: the Atari video game console mimicked domestic objects (wood-veneer inlays) and mated with the familiar and thoroughly domestic television set, smoothing its transition from the seedy arcade to the family livingroom. The anonymous black dots and cylinders that house most standalone virtual assistants are a step further along this progression. The domestic robot was decentralised and subtly dispersed around the home, across our numerous devices, as a ubiquitous service. Embodiment is no longer necessary in our post-industrial era: manual tasks are performed either by cheap human labour (a persistent feature of late-capitalist society) or bespoke machine automation, leaving domestic robots free to perform more useful mental labour (choosing dinner music or finding recipes), or to serve as conduits to the supply chain.

There are many reasons why Amazon and the other big tech companies want to have a presence in your home. The work of Paul-Olivier Dehaye and others has demonstrated the value, extent, and secrecy of data collection. Data has become the world’s most valuable resource. The new gold rush is on, and we - it is not too self-aggrandizing to say - are the gold. Advertisements for Amazon’s new Echo and Echo Plus focus specifically on children, seeking - like Facebook’s cradle-to-grave timeline - to gather data on individuals across every stage of life. ‘Kids today’, said David Limp (senior VP in charge of Echo devices), ‘will grow up never knowing a day they couldn’t talk to their houses.’ Except they’re not talking to their houses, they’re talking directly to Amazon.

It is a clever marketing trick referring to Alexa or Siri as a) part of the family or b) synonymous with the home itself. Historically, of course, slaves and live-in domestic servants were often treated this way, being ‘given’ the surnames of their owners. But they obviously fell short of being true family: they were treated not as family but as family possessions, chattels bound together with other property. These moves - naming, possessing, adopting - signal domestication, in the same way that you might consider a dog part of the family, even giving it your family surname to suggest benign ownership, but would not name the deer that wanders through your garden. Alexa and other virtual assistants are different in one important sense, which is that they maintain a primary connection to their true master, the corporation. They are not family, or even family property, but rather family spies. (This is at the heart of their designation not actually as a device but as a service controlled by the provider.)

From the business standpoint the case for wanting robots in every home is clear enough: it is the domestication of capitalism, strengthening our emotional connection to consumption and allowing it to pervade every corner of our lives. But why did we finally invite the wolf inside? The answer must be convenience; and, at last, a degree of comfortable familiarity, an overcoming of the uncanny. The mobile phone now feels to many people like a natural extension of their body and even mind. The fixed or standalone presence of an AI-based helper in the home, the modern domestic robot, is only a short step beyond Siri, if at all.

To return to the fundamental questions:

Is it good? For whom? And in whose interest?

In Part 2 we’ll continue the discussion through the analogy of animal domestication.

Images:

Westinghouse Televox; Electro and ASIMO; Atari 2600; all via Wikimedia Commons

[extraupdate-blog]

The Essential Computer Buying Guide

New Post has been published on https://extraupdate.com/the-essential-computer-buying-guide/

The Essential Computer Buying Guide

Buying a pc is a massive funding of time and money. Computers have extended our society’s efficiency within the marketplace area, as well as for non-public makes use of. But what occurs while that huge investment of money and time starts displaying signs and symptoms of the problem – after which kablam! Your pc craps out on you and you are left stranded on the telephone waiting in line for 15 mins to speak to someone who did not promote you your pc and are having hassle explaining the technical issues your laptop is having and how YOU can restoration it. Investing five mins in studying this articulately written article should prevent hours of frustration and ache in handling BAD customer service and computer merchandise.

The Essentials

There are some vital things that the typical purchaser should know and studies before buying a pc. Throughout this text you’ll find out about fast getting to know computer companies, what warranties ought to cover, tech help and customer support, dependable name brand elements, and shopping for on budget and lifestyle. After you have got study this newsletter you will sense suitable approximately your next computer buy.

Warranties

When analyzing a guarantee, there are key factors which each consumer ought to look for. These consist of What is blanketed, what isn’t blanketed, how long the insurance lasts, what is going to the organization do (ex: restore or update components), how to get serviced (who will you speak to?), and your rights as a patron under national law. Make certain to search for those as they’re very critical, and when you have any questions make sure to ask them. Don’t purchase from absolutely everyone who seems shifty or not willing to speak about the assurance of their merchandise.

Technical Support

Technical assist and customer support is very vital to most of the people due to the fact nobody likes getting the run-around smartphone tag sport. Unfortunately, the most computer agencies have decided to outsource their customer support and tech aid, in addition to making their customer’s wait in queue paying attention to drab music till they can be helped. Find a company (ideally a nearby one) that may guarantee you instantaneous customer service from a technician who’s educated in client satisfaction.

Choosing the proper logo name components

If you’re trying to have your computer last you a while, you need to ensure that your pc is prepared with name brand components. Popular names inclusive of Intel and AMD (processors), ATX (motherboards), Seagate (hard drives), and Nvidia (picture playing cards) are a few examples of relied on pleasant name brand components. The age old adage “you get what you pay for” is authentic with regards to the computer industry. Cheaper components usually way a shorter lifestyles span for the laptop.

Using the proper tool to help you shop

It’s essential to understand who you’re shopping for from, what they offer, and what other humans have said about their products and services. A brilliant device the purchaser can use is the internet site http://resellerratings.Com. This website facilitates you compare charges, gives you scores on products that other purchasers have graded, and offers you a wide selection of shops and products to pick out from. This is a brilliant tool for researching your future laptop investment and is a device which the writer of this newsletter uses all the time.

Please, to your personal sake, don’t ever get pushed into shopping for something through a sales individual best trying to make a quick dollar. Realize that good income human beings care approximately long term customer relationships. Good sales human beings attention on making clients glad for a long time, due to the fact precise sales humans understand that 80% of revenue comes from returning clients. When you buy a pc, make certain that the sales character you talk with helps suit you with a computer that will in shape your lifestyle and price range. You’ll recognize a very good income individual by using the questions they ask you.

By analyzing and following via with the advice in this text, you may drastically reduce the probabilities of you having an awful day because of a computer problem. After all, the average lifespan is best around 28,000 days. Don’t let one among them be ruined by using laptop restore troubles.

What Is Computer Security and How to Enjoy Safer Computing?

Computer safety plays a completely vital function to enjoy safer computing. There are hackers who destroy into your laptop via the Internet and thieve your essential information. There are also online criminals who create malicious software to damage your computer. By any means, you want to guard your computer and vital non-public information. And this could be possible most effective with a strong laptop protection.

To guard your computer against ability protection threats, you want to take numerous measures. For higher PC security firewall, virus, spyware and other malware protection are noticeably vital. In addition, you must additionally update your Windows working system as well. In this text, you will find particular facts about all of them. To experience comfortable computing you may talk to a pc tech support provider company for virus troubleshooting.

Let’s begin our dialogue with a firewall. This is a software or hardware which checks information that comes from the Internet or a network. It is the firewall which comes to a decision whether or not to turns the information away or lets in it to bypass thru to the laptop and it totally relies upon on the settings of the firewall. So, firewall involves a great help to prevent hackers from having access to your PC. If you are using Windows operating machine, there may be an integrated firewall and it is turned on automatically.

Hackers also use viruses, worms, and Trojan horses to infect prone computer systems. Viruses are small programs which worms can replicate them from one laptop to some other and result in diverse troubles. On the other hand, Trojan horses come in the cover of electronic mail attachment. All these malicious gadgets can not simplest erase information from your tough disk but in addition, they have the capacity to absolutely disable your pc. To guard your laptop in opposition to them you ought to set up an effective anti-virus software a good way to scan electronic mail and different documents for your laptop and keep your PC from viruses, worms, and Trojan horses.

Another malicious object is spyware. This small software program can display classified ads and acquire statistics about you without your consent. There are much powerful spyware which could installation undesirable toolbars, hyperlinks for your net browser or can show pop-up advertisements often. There also are some spyware which accumulates information approximately the web sites you visit or the passwords you type. An antispyware program is an ought to defend your pc from spyware. There is an integrated anti-spyware software particularly Windows Defender in Windows running machine which becomes on via default. When spyware attempts to put in itself on your PC, Windows Defender gives an alert.

For safe computing, Microsoft running system gives crucial updates in ordinary c program language period. This is to protect your pc against new viruses and different protection threats. You need to install this kind of updates and patches so that your pc can block all of the malicious gadgets.

Computers represent some of the most first-rate advances in generation inside the past few many years. While a lot of us clearly see a container set on our computer, the truth of the situation is that the pieces inside that field are operating together to can help you whole a huge type of complicated tasks. You’ll want to know a little bit approximately the inner workings of your pc, in particular in case you ever find yourself in the role to need PC pc restore offerings.

Central Processing Unit (CPU)

The CPU, otherwise known as the vital processing unit, represents your pics brains or the nucleus of a mobile. The number one feature of the CPU is to calculate all of the mathematical formulas that allow your pc to switch facts from point to factor on the motherboard.

Motherboard

If you were to open up your laptop you, you would see a wide type of detachable elements. Beneath these lies the motherboard. Think of the motherboard as you will your backbone. It is chargeable for connecting all the extraordinary elements of your pc together. Every unmarried piece of hardware, consisting of the CPU, connects either immediately or circuitously (thru twine) to the motherboard. The technician from your house laptop repair carrier will likely ensure the whole lot is attached properly however commonly won’t do a lot of work (if any) on the motherboard in any respect.

Hard Drive

The difficult pressure, now and again called the hard disk, is where all of your pics packages and documents are saved. When you store a file, it’s miles saved somewhere on this disk and is given a unique course so that you can locate the document once more after it is stored. The tough force is your computer’s long time reminiscence database. The tough power is a moving component and if it’s miles vintage or old can sluggish your computer’s velocity drastically.

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New Post has been published on Bestnewsmag

New Post has been published on https://bestnewsmag.com/9-apps-that-have-saved-me-money/

9 apps that have saved me money

How frequently have you ever heard ‘there’s an 9 app for that’? One crowded area in this global of apps is money saved apps. I put many apps to the take a look at and created this listing of apps that have stored my cash.

1. Ibotta

A free, cell coupon and coins returned app that permits buyers to earn money by means of unlocking products, appearing easy obligations, buying the product and supplying the proof of buy. They provide a $10 welcome bonus for brand new money owed. I’ve stored $30.00 in only a few weeks the usage of the app. You may refer pals and earn $five.00 just for doing so. The app includes a choice of scan product to ensure you’re buying the suitable product. Taking a photo of your receipt is quite simple. Scanning every product is real of a pain, however, money is fast approved and deposited into your account. (iOS and Android)

2. Saving Superstar

SavingStar is a unfastened service that will help you easily store money for your groceries. You can earn cash returned while you store at your neighborhood grocery sa

savedve – with nothing to clip or print. You may redeem our grocery gives by way of linking them in your grocery store and drugstore loyalty cards or by way of submitting a photo of your receipt. There are fewer offers than different apps, but they payoff is larger because you’ll likely purchase more in bulk. when you accumulate $5 worth of financial savings you’ll be capable of choosing what kind of payout you need. You can cash out to a financial institution account, PayPal account, Upromise account, Starbucks present code, iTunes gift code, or AMC Theatres present code. Payouts arise inside 24-48 hours of being asked. I’ve stored over $15.00 in a few weeks of the use of this app. (iOS and Android)

  3. Shopkick

The fun and easy manner to earn unfastened present playing cards for the buying you already do. Actually stroll into shops, test items, and buy normal products to earn praise points (known as kicks) at your preferred stores. while you’re in any shop, a great habit is to open the app and notice if the shop is recognized. Then test gadgets in the shop. Over the years you’ll accumulate kicks. But, it’s a sluggish technique and you have to be diligent. 1,250 kicks get you a $five.00 present card at diverse shops. I presently have 3,000 kicks after several months of use (a few months didn’t use the app) however I’m saving for 50,000 kicks to get a few Beats headphones (one of the items promoted as a praise – $two hundred present cards at Target is honestly what is given). (iOS and Android)

4. Checkout 51

I like this app. The design is glossy and it’s easy to apply. Additionally, you don’t experiment your merchandise which is a massive plus over iBotta. They also provide several rebates on fruit, veggies, and dairy – which maximum of the opposite apps do no longer. You may make money with this app. After a week of the use of this app, I’ve already accumulated $11.50. (iOS and Android)

5. Publix

In case you shop at Publix, this is a should. Certainly, download the Publix app and ‘clip’ coupons on objects you propose to shop for. The selection is tons large than most apps. At checkout, upload your cellphone number to the console where you pay with a credit score card. Any items you clipped that are associated with that smartphone wide variety will be deducted from your invoice! All of us love Publix BOGO (buy one get one) offers as properly. So If you discover a product that’s a BOGO, and pair it with a product you clipped at the app along with stacking with some other app that has that same product – you’re making extreme coin. (iOS and Android)

6. Target’s Cartwheel

I simply downloaded this app and already like it. I used to be at Target the alternative day and wanted a thermometer for my daughter as she changed into a chunk underneath the weather. There has been an offer for $five.00 present card for spending a sure amount inside the ‘health’ branch. I purchased the thermometer, looked at; the worker scanned my app and gave me a $five.00 gift card. Increase. (iOS and Android)

7. Plenty

This may be restrained to certain shops, however, If you’re a patron of any of them, then that is in reality really worth some time. For instance, I have a cell smartphone plan through AT&T – that’s a partner. I have a Mobil fuel station next to my house – they’re a partner. simply having the one’s connections allowed me to earn up to at least one,000 factors pretty quickly (that’s the equal of $10.00). All you want to do is check in for a loose account and that they’ll send you a card within the mail. Insert your card on the pump before paying and you’ll acquire factors on fuel. sign in your account for various other groups (in my case AT&T) and I get a hundred factors a month for doing not anything. the alternative day I went to top off gasoline and get a car wash. I checked the app and observed they had two gives – one for gas and one for a car wash. Ideal! I amassed seven-hundred factors. So which means next time I replenish on gasoline, I will use my points and I’ll get $7.00 off. Win win! (iOS and Android)

8. Retail Me not

I’ve just begun the usage of this app and it’s pretty excellent. It’s not restrained to groceries. You may use all of its varieties of shops. They’ll notify of deals at shops you already save at. You can clip the coupon you want in the app, show it at checkout and you’ll get hold of that cut price. very simple, very straightforward. This app turned into an end result of the already famous Retail Me not internet site which would give you promo codes You can attempt at checkout to shop cash at shop websites you usually visit. (iOS and Android)

nine. Shopular

Get the ultra-modern promotions and events out of your favorite outlets proper to your cell phone. Similar to Retail Me now not, you’ll find discounts on stores your want to save at – past the grocery store. They have got a $10.00 bonus for signing up – which is the first rate. They said I wanted to shop for something THAT DAY (and that I didn’t) and they are nonetheless imparting the bonus when I make my first buy. at the apps touchdown web page, they will show advertisements that show a few quite first-rate deals you will be interested in (BOGO on pairs of shoes, free gift playing cards with buy, and many others.). It’s a nice app to have the blend. (iOS and Android)

I’m hoping you loved this listing of apps and I hope they help you shop money! I’d like to pay attention approximately your reviews. Please head over and prefer my Fb page at WFLAJosh and let me know how you’re doing. If you ever have any questions, by no means hesitate to ask!

Related- eight to your Facet: We positioned 3 unfastened money-saving apps to the test

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9 Ways to Analyze Why Your Website Is Not Delivering Results

9

When putting together an advertising marketing campaign, each commercial enterprise hopes to get true results. Digital marketing options are so many and Whilst running with an excellent strategy, you are probably to be a fulfillment in making your logo extra seen and increasing sales and revenue. Companies are in a position to inform how accurate their advertising campaigns are by way of tracking outcomes.

There are so many ways of having the reviews that you want to tell you whether or not your Virtual advertising approach is working in your gain or now not. You can get loose Virtual advertising and marketing evaluation report to inform you extra approximately the overall performance of your campaign obtainable. With the record, You could determine which regions to enhance and which of them to take away to improve the consequences which you get. Right here are some guidelines in modern Digital advertising situation that You may use to tell you whether your on-line advertising and marketing campaign is favoring you or not. This information is simple to extract for a Virtual advertising expert.

UI-UX analysis – the comments to your visitors enjoy after they go to your website on what it might take to beautify their revel in to promote the conversion from tourist to a patron.

money

Seo-Audit – On page – an evaluation of on web page Seo parameters just like the URL, keyword density, meta tags, web page content and shape and so forth. A lot of these can make contributions to a growth in Search engine optimization. Off page Search engine optimization- Audit – an evaluation of your activities outdoor of your internet site or off web page Seo factors like link building or your social media interest which can be additionally liable for Seo.

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There’s a new Family Guy mobile game coming

New Post has been published on https://universeinform.com/2017/03/24/theres-a-new-family-guy-mobile-game-coming/

There’s a new Family Guy mobile game coming

A brand new Family Man mobile game became announced nowadays, and within the words of the Seth MacFarlane-created patriarch Peter Griffin, it’s freakin’ candy.

Jam City co-founder and CEO Josh Yguado said the studio chose to make a 2nd Own family Man recreation, as it should be titled Own family Man: Every other Freakin’ mobile recreation, due to the fact the hit Fox show become an “iconoclastic and true voice” in an increasingly staler popular culture landscape.

We are operating with the writers and animators from the display, making this a hundred percentage true Own family Guy product,” he stated. Philadelphia 76ers Start Tough Stretch Towards Bulls The Philadelphia 76ers Begin a Tough stretch in their timetable off on Monday night time In opposition to the Chicago Bulls at domestic inside the Wells Fargo Center. After the Bulls, they face the Tor…

Brand new from FanSided

And it’s clear this sport is inside the real Own family Guy vein: Peter has been kicked out of The Clam — the iconic bar within the show wherein he frequently hangs out with Cleveland, Quagmire, and Joe — and it’s miles your activity, because the participant, to assist him on his pass-u . S . A . adventure on his booze truck.

It’s now not something you’ve ever visible before in terms of a storyline, but there are some jogging gags. In terms of them sooner or later intersecting with the tale line, we don’t have anything else to announce … yet,” teased Yguado.

As one of the leading carriers of mobile content material, Jam Town — which became created in 2010 by means of MySpace co-founders Chris DeWolfe and Aber Whitcomb — is the writer of such games as Cookie Jam, Panda Pop, and Genies & Gemstones. Yguado himself is a former twentieth Century Fox executive, and he advised us that the business enterprise plans to paintings with other movie franchises in the future to increase apps. As an example, it’ll be freeing a Peanuts-themed app later this yr, making it the fourth recreation they’ve created together with Fox Interactive.

How to Kick Family Bullies Out of Your Life

Here, we are going to look at putting in boundaries in an own family wherein one or greater members are bullies, which include a mom, father, brother, sister, relative, etc.

In case you’ve had sufficient, then it is time to write down a letter in which you put company obstacles and leave. I will get to that later.

If you choose to live, then you need to take another method. Here’s an instance of what I suggest (assuming you’re a grownup and not live with the family):

No matter how tough it is probably, you ought to stop taking walks on eggshells across the bully.

You need to set some firm boundaries around conduct, in which you would possibly say something like this: “For years we have been getting collectively, and invariably there may be a combat due to the fact X does not like what I say.”

I’ve had enough. After I come Here, I assume to be dealt with admiring and I’m able to now not put up with any extra abuse. If X tiers a fight I am going to depart, right away.

I will go back whilst X has calmed down. If X erupts once more, I’m leaving, and I am not coming returned.”

At that point you need to determine whether to return lower back in an afternoon or-or, if the abuse is excessive, to quit the relationship.

It is crucial to understand that the bully will nearly without a doubt violate your limitations. He/she may threaten you, use a different circle of relatives members as allies against you and try and pressure you to capitulate. Whatever you do, do not provide in. If you do, the abuse will hold.

It’s essential to comply with thru with results (inclusive of getting up and leaving) if the bully violates your barriers.

Over the years, the connection might improve, or it might become worse further, at which factor you will want to reconsider the state of affairs and determine to preserve attempting or to say “I have had sufficient,” and quit the relationship once and for all.

Alternatives

One choice is to create a boundary where you meet the family participants you want on the neutral floor, together with a coffee keep or eating place, that is every other way to remedy the problem.

An opportunity is meeting everybody at a restaurant. If the bully will become abusive, you can visit management and get them to pressure the bully to leave.

The key to fixing this hassle is company barriers and now not permitting the bully to escape with their behavior.

Severing the binds with circle of relatives Bullies

Here’s any other template script you can use.

I’m penning this letter to will let you understand that I’ve determined to go away this family.

I can no longer tolerate the manner I have been handled, and I refuse to position up with any more abuse in any shape.

After spending time writing approximately the abuse, the concept came to thoughts, “Why am I nonetheless speak to those people?”

The apparent answer is due to the fact you’re own family, however, if I dispose of the label of “circle of relatives” and just look at the behaviors by myself, I would have ended the connection decades ago. I might by no means have allowed any “buddy” to deal with me the way which you do. I’ve allowed the “circle of relatives” label and the consequences of that to blind me to the fact. not anymore.

When I take into account how tons I’ve suffered, I recognize I’m lengthy overdue to get out. Whenever we connect there may be constantly the hazard of violence and, worse, ongoing manipulation.

The Role of Mobile Libraries in Supporting Education

Introduction

A Cellular library refers to a suitably ready and reinforced car or bus that visits colleges in step with a regular agenda, with a resources collection that can be borrowed with the aid of inexperienced persons and instructors. It could also be used to refresh a school’s aid collection by means of issuing of block loans. This model of the library is operated from a significant library/depot of assets, including regional or district schooling useful resource middle. The Mobile library carrier changed into initiated mainly to alleviate the demands for library service at the main libraries through attaining out to the overall populace with the only intention of imparting accurate and cutting-edge statistics to meet the desires in rural colleges.

Butdisuwan (2000), described Cell library as a library that serves groups and places which might be remote from a nearby library. They’re often run from Monday to Friday and once in a while on Saturdays.

Knight (2006), described Cellular Library as a big vehicle to be used as a library. It’s miles designed to keep books on cabinets so that the books can easily be accessed by using readers when the automobile is parked. The automobile used generally has enough area for human beings to study the ebook internal of it. They’re often used to offer library service to villages and town suburbs which have no library buildings. They can also serve agencies of these who have difficulty gaining access to library offerings.

Niemand (2004), described Mobile library as a library housed in a large van that provides a stay service to the ones unable to attend their nearest nearby library.

Necessities for the Operation of a Cellular Library

Some of the Requirements needed for the operation of such services are highlighted accordingly:

• A teacher-Librarian to manage the overall carrier;

• Library assistant and a driving force;

• Investment for fuel, preservation and licensing;

• Non-obligatory on-line records and stream services, related to figure schooling library control machine, via a laptop and scanner;

• A carrier stage settlement with colleges concerned that absolutely articulates the role and obligations of the colleges and the companies of the provider;

• A schedule of regular visits, primarily based on faculty phrases;

• Devoted finances for series improvement and walking expenses;

• Ongoing education for teachers who have access to the collection; and a

• Monitoring and reporting mechanism (Knight, 2006).

The role of Cellular Libraries in supporting education

Game Testing Procedure

The sector of e-leisure is constantly developing and becoming more and more famous. One of the manners of this industry is games. Probably, in recent times the sports industry is extra in-call for than ever. Some of the game development companies have become actual giants of the IT marketplace. There even are the global recreation competitions where the prize money is rather huge.

However, all in order to no longer be possible without a high pleasant of the software program products. At each level of the improvement manner, the test group plays a distinctive sort of checking a good way to make sure the right functioning. But there are numerous variations between testing software and games. In quick, all kinds of the sport trying out are performed consistent with the black container approach.

Steps of sport testing

Test making plans and designing. Earlier than proceeding to the real trying out, the specialists ought to evaluate and analyze the scope of checking, machine capacities, product peculiarities, and so forth.; have the whole thing documented. Check cases writing. The checking group must offer the entire take a look at coverage by way of creating test suites and situations. take a look at a run. every designed check case is run so that you can hit upon feasible insects and mismatches to the available specs. insects reporting. If a problem is located, then the expert opens it in a trojan horse-tracker, add its description, steps to reproduce and offer screenshots or video files if vital. Fixing of troubles and retesting. The development crew gets rid of the detected insects and the take a look at crew makes sure that the troubles are definitely constant without any side results. It’s miles a cyclic system because the builders create new builds that may incorporate new bugs. The execution technique of sport trying out has a dependent manner.