#unreal engine supremacy

[theribbajack]

An update: I Am Not Normal

If the Oblivion Remastered trailer is actually good I will Not be normal about it for the next few days

[floortile34]

once again god is a shitty ass fucking coder. why is the human genome so fucked up? and what's with all the convoluted functions with the neurotransmitters? and why didnt you build the mammary glands from scratch, instead of reusing sweat glands? actually just generally why sweat gland code reused so much? and like did you ever refactor any of this code? wtf is up with the chromosomes?? like it's all thrown together so sloppy and convoluted, that like if you wont make actual use of splitting up the genome like that, just make it monolithic. make it one chromosome. and like i dont even know what the fuck you were thinking when you made the brain

like, after making so many species i'd assume the latter half would be pretty good. tho to be reasonable basically all of it is just reused from earlier things with no refactoring of any sort

like i know you only had 2 days for this, but like- ohh, was that like a challenge? like making a global ecosystem in 2 days?

but like if it wasnt, just chill out and stop for a while to rethink your stuff. like if you did this through a few weeks every species would be a masterpiece of bioengineering instead of whatever barely functional piles of code we are now

[pigsongpearls]

Kamapua'a and Pele

Prompt:

Create a mythological image of Kamapua'a in a wrestling match with his lover Pele. Kamapua'a is a Hawaiian trickster figure, half human and half wild boar. Pele is the Hawaiian goddess of fire and volcanoes. Kamapua'a and Pelé are lovers, but they also fight for supremacy. Their wrestling is said to be both a fight and a courtship.

Nightcafé Studio

Corrected with Grok ai (legs)

Kamapua'a, a muscular, half-human, half-wild boar, with sharp tusks and a mischievous glint in his eye, grapples with his lover Pele, the fiery Hawaiian goddess, amidst a backdrop of smoldering volcanic rocks and twisted lava flows. Pele's long, fiery hair flows like molten lava as she wrestles Kamapua'a, her skin aglow with a warm, golden light. The air is charged with tension and passion as they engage in a fierce, yet sensual, battle for supremacy. Cinematic lighting, with deep shadows and warm highlights, accentuates the drama of the scene, as if shot on 35mm film with a V-Raptor XL camera. The image is infused with a subtle film grain, vignette, and post-processing effects, evoking a sense of epic, atmospheric grandeur, reminiscent of the cinematic styles of Terrence Malick, Alejandro González Iñárritu, and Darren Aronofsky.

Kamapua'a, a powerful half-human, half-wild boar, and Pele, the fiery Hawaiian goddess of volcanoes, engage in a fierce and passionate wrestling match, their bodies entwined in a struggle that is both a fight for supremacy and a courtship ritual. Kamapua'a's tusked face is set in a fierce snarl, while Pele's eyes blaze with fiery intensity, her long, flowing hair aflame with vibrant, molten hues. The dark fantasy scene is set against a backdrop of ancient, mist-shrouded Hawaiian landscapes, with twisted lava trees and glowing volcanic rocks. Dynamic lighting casts dramatic shadows, illuminating the intricate, hyper-detailed textures of the characters' skin, fur, and lava-encrusted surroundings. Inspired by the works of Greg Rutkowski, Alphonse Mucha, and Jordan Grimmer, this 8k resolution masterpiece showcases a unique blend of traditional and digital media, with deep, rich colors and subtle, nuanced shading. Volumetric lighting and Unreal Engine-style effects add depth and dimensionality to the scene, while the bold, complementary colors of purple and yellow create a visually striking contrast.

Kamapua'a, a demigod with the physique of a muscular Hawaiian warrior and the sharp tusks and bristly fur of a wild boar, grapples with his lover Pele, the fiery goddess of volcanoes, in a dramatic wrestling match. Pele's long, flowing hair blazes with a fiery intensity, as if infused with the molten lava of the volcanoes she controls. Her skin glistens with a warm, golden light, while Kamapua'a's rugged, earthy tones provide a striking contrast. The two lovers-turned-adversaries are bathed in the warm, golden light of a tropical sunset, with the misty veil of a waterfall cascading in the background. The atmosphere is charged with tension and passion, as if the very fate of the Hawaiian islands hangs in the balance. Inspired by the cinematic styles of Peter Jackson and Guillermo del Toro, with a hint of the fantastical and mythological, this image is a live-action, 35mm film still, with a warm, cinematic color grade, subtle film grain, and a vignette that draws the viewer's eye to the heart of the action.

ChatGBT

I'll portray both Kamapuaʻa and Pele as full-bodied, well-nourished figures, radiating strength, sensuality, and elemental power.

Kamapuaʻa will have a lush, powerful build—round-faced, with boar-like features such as a short snout, tusks peeking from a smirking mouth, and thick, bristly hair. His body will be solid and strong, with a wild, earthy presence—part rainforest warrior, part mischievous boar spirit. Maybe some pigskin texture on parts of his body, and leaves or ferns growing from his shoulders or waist.

Pele will appear equally full-bodied, glowing with volcanic beauty—curvy, intense, and majestic, with flowing lava-like hair and a gown of molten rock and fire. Her expression should be fierce and loving at once, capturing the paradox of passion and combat.

They’ll be entangled mid-wrestle, bodies pressed together, Pele’s fire flaring where it meets Kamapuaʻa’s earthy, steamy aura—like mist rising where lava touches wet ground.

So glad you love it! That earthy intensity between them really comes through, doesn’t it? I can absolutely push it further into cinematic territory if you'd like—more dynamic lighting, deeper shadows, swirling steam, glowing lava cracks underfoot, maybe even ash falling in the air. Just say the word and I’ll dial it up like a mythic movie poster.

And in the style of Paul Gauguin:

[golike-doit]

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[fanfoolishness]

For @weadapt who was wondering where these angles came from: Flycam supremacy!!! https://opm.fransbouma.com/uuuv4.htm it was a little complicated to install and figure out at first but with help I got it up and running on my PC and then I’ve just been replaying any cutscene I get obsessively to take screencaps 😂 It’s a pity I don’t know to gif them, but even the caps are a lot of fun.

For all my fans of Cal whump out there ;_;

[daniwoitkowski]

Hidden Figures

Hidden Figures: The Story of the African-American Women Who Helped Win the Space Race, the untold truth behind the importance of women of color in NASA during the time when we were looking to the stars, literally. The book was written by Margot Lee Shetterly, later protruded on film in 2016. Margot Lee Shetterly is an American non-fiction writer who aimed to shed a light on the remarkable work that these three friends had not received public praise for, in the race to launch a man into space in from the 1930s to the 1960s.

Katherine Johnson, Dorothy Vaughn, and Mary Jackson are three friends who work as “human” computers as labeled for the women mathematicians at NASA during the time. All three women compute complex math problems as part of a group of black women. Conditions are not ideal, as they are segregated away from the white computers and only hired on temporary basis. All three women are continuously not recognized for their hard work and under paid from not only the men but the other white women computers they work with. These women are inspiring and confidence in their abilities which is reinforced through their friendship. After a shortage with male mathematicians who could complete complex calculations, shortly after WWII federal agencies started hiring women.

A “girl” could be paid significantly less than a man for doing the same job. And male engineers, once freed from laborious math work, could focus on more “serious” conceptual and analytical projects. (2016, April 14)

These brave women were not only highly intelligent top tier minds in their field. These amazing women had to struggle through a time where the world was openly led by men and deal with segregation and white people consistently looking down on them for the color of their skin. The story highly suggests the role of “computers” were to perform the routine tasks for the benefit of the top tier white men who receive the credit. However, indications on how women were introduced into programming in science were eluded.

Johnson is selected to compute calculations for space task group having to leave the building and basically run a half mile to ‘colored ladies room’ just to relieve herself. She powerfully disputes predominantly male colleagues, while we play witness through the film watching their ignorance attempting to overcome their habituated supremacy. In reality, though the film did explicit moving scenes Johnson’s bathroom issues, Jackson was the one who had the bathroom encounters having a complaint against her for using the unlabeled white-only bathrooms. Invisible racism through unrealized white privilege is seen during the film when Johnson’s supervisor Mr. Harrison, misses judgments Johnson’s bathroom disappearances or segregated tactics from his white male employees. The progression for black women was definitely far slower and more grueling than depicted in the film. Mistreatment of minorities and women in the workplace is still can still be seen today, particularly in the ongoing pay gap debate, which the film touches on briefly.

The significance of the lack of ethnic minorities in science during this time is again highlighted when Vaughan takes it upon herself to increase her credibility and knowledge by researching IBM, however there are no such related books in the ‘black library’ and she ends up getting kicked out of the library due to the ethnic segregation in this time. Karl Zielinski: “There is another opening in the Engineer Training Program. Jackson, who had the mind of an engineer and a supervisor who inquired if she would pursue to be an engineer if she were a white male.

Mary Jackson replied: “I wouldn’t have to; I’d already be one.”

Jackson had to take certain graduate classes in mathematics and physics, which were only offered at an all-white high school at night. She had to jump through many hoops to be allowed to study there, but, eventually, she did it.

Over and over, Hidden Figures demonstrates how these amazing women, were able to ascend through NASA and it wasn’t due to their white colleagues suddenly not being racist. Their internal challenges changed amongst them since NASA’s interest for them reflected to. It might not be heartwarming, but it’s certainly realistic.

While Hidden Figures illustrates that good can overcome dismantling barriers in the pursuit of common interests, it doesn’t offer white absolution.

This story portrays the discouragement of black women displaying how completely disregarded they are with the intellect they convey to science. These were amazing and should be celebrated for the positions they held in our history. The women were beyond intelligent with humbled dispositions and only sought out for solutions. At the time of the film Katherine Johnson, the last one of the three surviving had still wondered why anyone would want to make a film about her life. Katherine Johnson passed at the age of 101 on February 24, 2020. (2016, December 6)

Cites:

Uploaded by 20th Century Studios. (2016, April 14). MARGOT LEE SHETTERLY: RESEARCH. WRITE. REPEAT. http://margotleeshetterly.com/hidden-figures-nasas-african-american-computers

Margot Lee Shetterly. (2016, December 6) Hidden Figures: The Story of the African-American Women Who Helped Win the Space Race. William Morrow Paperbacks

[linuxgamenews]

Spirit of Europe - Origins jRPG wants your vote for Linux

Spirit of Europe - Origins educational single-player jRPG game offers hope for a Linux port with Windows PC. Thanks to details from developer Predict Edumedia. Currently available free to play on both Steam and Itch.io. Predict Edumedia is proud to release Spirit of Europe - Origins. This is also a free, educational single-player jRPG game with a reflective flavour. Available for download on Windwows PC but may offer Linux too. Take on a fragment of the mythical Europa and travel through history. Right from the ancient times to the Renaissance. While you make it through the realm of thoughts and emotions. Here spirits fight for supremacy over human consciousness. Experience a humanistic metaphor of historical events as we know the. You will also possess over a hundred characters. Then drive their actions and witness their outcomes in pivotal events of Europe’s past. According to Predict Edumedia in an email reply. The studio is interested in Linux support. But they also have demands, given the example below.

...if there are at least 100 potential, interested players using Linux.

Spirit of Europe - Origins is developed in Unreal Engine 4. Originally Linux was not planned for the game. However, due to sharing interest and the fact a native port is certainly very possible. The developer want to ensure there is sufficient interest from the Linux community. The Spirit of Europe - Origins follows the story of Europe. Working through some key historical periods. Such as Ancient Greece and The Roman Empire. The Migration Period and the Viking Age. As well as the Middle Ages and Renaissance.

Spirit of Europe - Origins - Gameplay Trailer

Experience history with a twist. The view of Gods, with your own virtues and vices. These are all different from those of mere mortals in the spirit world. All while being inspired by common stories and western ideas. In Spirit of Europe - Origins this is the core basis that modern western society is built on. Such as peace, democracy, rule of law, freedom, grit, and diversity. But it's also up to us to discover the rest. Discover the forging of Europe and the birth of the western ethos. You can also possess any mortal. While it be a mere commoner or a great figure of history. Drive their actions and learn about their way of life and beliefs. Including their fears, hopes, goals, and desires. Since you may be surprised at what you uncover. Assemble your troops and manage your resources. In Spirit of Europe - Origins you will work to gain influence with the living. All while inspiring them to build the great structures we know today. Gather the souls of defeated vices. Using them to summon allies from among those fallen through the ages. Improve them with godly roots for they will be your shield. Doing so against the forces that seek your undoing. You will witness how the worst foes can become allies. By your hand shall history be made. Since you can be the invisible hand that forges Europe’s history. Right from the ancient times of Classical Greece. All the way through the glory of the Roman Empire. The uproar of its fall and the chaos that followed. With the bonds formed in the Middle Ages. Your Spirit of Europe - Origins journey work through Europe. this will only end once it’s reborn - or will it?

Features:

Free;

Historically precise educational content;

Two realms: the spirit realm and the material one;

Possession system, allowing you to take control of any NPC;

Economy and building system used to upgrade and recruit units;

Disciples II inspired. Spirit of Europe - Origins offers tactical, turn based combat;

A deeply logical, fictional story line involving gods. Including virtues, vices, concepts, and thoughts. All manifested as spirits;

Over 15 hours of gameplay;

58 combat units with over 50 unique abilities;

Over 240 NPCs to interact with. Right from ancient Greece to the 12th century European Renaissance;

13 unique maps offering over 20 quests;

Possess & explore the world with over 240 characters. From mere commoners to great figures of European history.

Special note:

In order to gain access to Spirit of Europe - Origins, you will need to register. Then complete the educational single-player jRPG initial review. With a few history type questions on the game’s official website. Spirit of Europe - Origins is available free to play on Steam and Itch.io. Offering Windows PC support, but with enough votes, a Linux port. Which also happens to work quite on Proton, should you want to play.

[ledgerudsw791-blog]

Absolutely Nothing To See Here. Just A Lot Of Us Concurring A 3 Fundamental Yes Movie Policies

The 12 ideal iPhone and also Android applications of 2018

Go over: Discover all the applications you've ever before downloaded on your phone.

Get the latest technology updates as well as breaking information on the go, straight to your phone, with the Komando.com Application, readily available in the Apple Store as well as Google Play Shop. There are 8 million applications offered on the Google play shop as of the first quarter of 2019.

We advise inspecting that out if points like that matter to you. The app in fact goes back to 2014, which would usually invalidate it from this listing. However we're making an exception as a result of the application's sheer supremacy because soaking up Musical.ly. Though the relocation initially came a as a shock to some followers of the karaoke application, it inevitably assisted thrust TikTok to the top of the charts in the Application Store as well as Google Play.

In some cases, it might even be much better than Tasker thanks to its simpleness and vast array of usages. It features a simple, paginated design that reveals you the current weather condition, forecast for approximately 12 weeks, a radar, and other enjoyable stats. Probably its best function is its marginal layout which just reveals you the climate.

What is the most used app?

TikTok, the China-born social media video app, was the second most downloaded app in 2019, beating Facebook, and Facebook-owned Messenger and Instagram. According to data firm Sensor Tower, TikTok got over 700 million downloads globally last year, while Facebook received just under 700 million downloads.

Exists a method to install Android apps on an iPhone?

Individuals can additionally gain TikTok Award factors by inviting friends to download the app, and after that they can redeem those points for discount coupons from brand names like Sephora as well as Uber. It's likewise feasible to invest real cash by adding virtual coins to your Purse. Google Pay is Mobile Settlement Application by Google, it is one application for all your settlement need. With Google Pay, you can get and also send out cash really rapidly, pay expenses, get online, reenergize Phone and recipe, Pay at offline stores, Bank to financial institution cash transfer. It is the most extensively utilized mobile area and GPS monitoring application.

iPhone XR got hold of 3% of the marketplace.

Can I get Android apps on my iPhone?

Nowadays, it's very easy to make a mobile app or a game. There are a lot of free tools that you can develop mobile games or app on them, like Unity3d, Unreal engine or Android Studio. With today's technology even a 10 years old can create a simple game in less than 4 hours!

Thus, the effect is turned around as well as power intake can really enhance. We told you regarding our favorite free apps for the iPhone, however that is just a dropping of what is offered in the App Store. There is a pretty good opportunity there are a few we've never ever even heard of. If you maintain a checklist of your passwords on a sheet of paper that you constantly appear to lose, or if you make use of the exact same 3 passwords for each account, you're doing it incorrect.

Newest Deals.

It features a straightforward design that helps you maintain your e-mails in line. Additionally, it comes with support for a ton of email service providers, color coding for company, application theming, Android Use assistance, and also widgets. have a peek at this web-site There are likewise a range of wise functions such as blocking notices during certain times (per account) to help personalize your experience. Really, there aren't several email applications extra personalized than this.

Both apps get lots of new updates and also functions regularly. Completion of 2018 is upon us and if you didn't download and install any new applications, after that you're missing out. I know-- it's occasionally unusual that one decade right into the Application Store, there are still enough fresh ideas to make it worth downloading and install a strange name. This number just represents new downloads, not re-installs or app updates, the report kept in mind.

If you have any type of issue pertaining to the web content or info on this blog site or you intend to share a pointer then feel free to leave a remark below. Among our team members will change you back asap.

Google Maps and Waze

Google Drive is a cloud storage space option available on Android where all new users get 15GB for free permanently upon subscribing. What makes Google Drive so special are the collection of Android apps that are attached to it.

What are the top 3 free apps?

CEO Tim Cook noted in January that the iPhone XR had been "the most popular iPhone every day, every single day." Third-party estimates have also backed up those claims. The iPhone XR received a price cut to $599 a few months ago when Apple introduced the iPhone 11 lineup, which will also help bolster demand.

Your viewing history, show suggestions, and also account information is saved as well as waiting on you on all of your devices. You can start watching on your iPad and surface on your iPhone.

applications everybody ought to carry their phone

The leading 13 applications could not be to everyone's taste, but it's difficult to claim there's anything incorrect with them. Tidy Master is the very first app on this checklist that you must prevent whatsoever costs. The OneDrive application additionally flaunts protection functions such as biometrics and also PIN codes to maintain your information risk-free in the event that you shed your phone. When we next off upgrade the listing, maintain an eye on these three Office applications-- they will certainly almost definitely fire also greater.

[privateplates4u]

Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 1LE: 4th Place – 2017 Motor Trend Best Driver’s Car

We’ve all heard about the bad old days at GM when no car was allowed to challenge the Corvette’s performance supremacy. Those days are long dead. Team Camaro has applied its 1LE handling philosophy to the monstrously powerful ZL1, and the resulting monster is the most track-capable road car GM has ever sold. Up front, the standard Camaro ZL1’s 6.2-liter supercharged V-8 still makes 650 horsepower and 650 lb-ft of torque because frankly it didn’t need to make more. Being an enthusiast’s car, a six-speed manual is the only transmission on offer. An electronically controlled differential rounds out the powertrain. Out at the corners, magnetic shocks are replaced with Multimatic spool-valve shocks, and like the rest of the suspension, they’re hard-mounted with metal bushings, not rubber. The ride height, front camber, and rear anti-roll bar are all manually adjustable. A bigger grille improves cooling, and dive planes on the front corners and a massive rear wing provide downforce across the car. Equally massive carbon-ceramic brakes do the stopping. It’s Best Driver’s Car week! Don’t miss the incredible story of how we chose the 2017 Best Driver’s Car right here, and stay tuned for the World’s Greatest Drag Race, coming soon. Put it all together, nail the launch, and you’ll see 60 mph in 3.6 seconds and an 11.7-second quarter mile at 123 mph flat. Going the other way, the 3,837-pound ZL1 1LE will stop from 60 mph in a scant 91 feet. Put it on a skidpad, and it’ll pull 1.11 average g. Fling it at the figure eight, and you’ll get a 23.0-second lap at 0.93 average g. We Say “This car needs five-point harnesses because the dampers are so unforgiving. It’s true this 1LE has incredible grip; however, the compression damping is way too harsh while the rebound damping is just right. I’m not sure where they tuned this, but it clearly did not have a lot of bumps and jumps. The steering is freakishly quick. It took me three corners to calm my hands down, so I didn’t steer into and across the apex. The power seems to be well matched for the chassis, for a change, unlike the Z06. Third gear seemed very tractable and had a wide bandwidth. This feels like what I imagine a ’60s-’70s Trans Am car would be like.” – Chris Walton “I know Jonny loves this car, but I just can’t warm to it. Probably because I’ve lost all my fillings, and my kidneys are bruised. With the exception of the best roads, the ride in this Camaro is punishing. I’ve encountered smoother paint mixers. I had to remind myself that based on the numbers, this car is fantastic. Endless grip, fade-free brakes, abundant horsepower. But the thing is, I didn’t care. The bouncing was so bad that I found myself reacting to that instead of focusing on sheer act of driving. The Camaro might be brilliant on the track, but I wouldn’t want to drive this to get there.” – Derek Powell Read about other 2017 Best Driver’s Car contenders: Ferrari 488 GTB Porsche 911 Turbo S Porsche 718 Cayman S Lexus LC 500 Mercedes-AMG GT R Alfa Romeo Giulia Quadrifoglio Chevrolet Corvette Grand Sport Aston Martin DB11 Nissan GT-R NISMO Mazda MX-5 Miata RF McLaren 570GT “Simply tremendous … tremendous grip, tremendous brakes, and tremendous power. And how about that third pedal? This added that special connection to the vehicle that the Ferrari or 911 Turbo simply can’t match, which is why I ranked it higher than those two fancy (and expensive) machines. With the Camaro, I felt like I—not some fancy software—had a big part in conquering 198.” – Erick Ayapana “That’s a driver’s car! When the aero and the tires shake hands, it’s a moment of revelation. You are suddenly driving a hard-mounted race car. Unreal. So much power, so much control, so much stopping ability. An absolute monster of a machine. This is an uncaged race car. Being able to actually use all 650 horsepower and 650 lb-ft of torque is mind-boggling. I’m not sure how this car isn’t a podium finisher.” – Jonny Lieberman “Long name, amazing results! Everywhere a competitor put a wheel in the air, the Camaro stuck like glue. There’s a lot of vertical movement in the cabin, but the car just sticks no matter what. It never jumps sideways a foot when it hits a mid-corner bump, never moves around laterally at all. Even when it feels like you’ve carried too much speed into a corner, it sticks. I can’t count how many times I put the throttle flat on the floor. In a 650-hp car this stiff on this bumpy road, that’s seriously impressive. The eLSD takes a little getting used to. If you start to feed in power mid-corner, the car turns in more as the diff gets to work. Steer with the throttle? Yes, please! “Brakes have huge stopping power and great pedal feel. Squeeze, don’t stomp, and get exactly what you want. “I thought this car would be too stiff for the road, and that’s coming from someone who drove the Z/28 for a year. I was wrong.” – Scott Evans Randy Says “It was not perfectly balanced for me. I’m really trying to smear a little lipstick from the perfection here, but it would go from a little teeny bit of understeer, which was perfect, to a little bit of oversteer, which is almost perfect. But when we put it in the context of what it is, which is a front-engine rear-drive car with 650 horsepower, the traction was incredible. It put down power extremely well, I could drive it with everything turned off, and for me, that’s just so much more satisfying. “The dampers felt great. Basically I never thought about it. Which means nothing came into my awareness as being, oh, this is too stiff. Or that is too soft. I don’t sense roll. So when I just turn for the corner, it just lies over there. That’s not good terminology because I don’t feel it roll. I’m sure it does, but I don’t feel it. Which means it’s got good damping. When I’m down in the corner, in the middle, I still have a steering response, and I can still tighten it up. “It was happy coming out of the corkscrew. That’s always hard in a powerful rear drive car. Put the power down. When you’re in a low gear and it’s a hard right. It wants to power oversteer. But this one was pretty damn good. Especially at that power level. See, we have to keep this in context. “The car generated a tremendous amount of braking force, but for the first time in any high-performance Camaro, it had a long pedal. I was pumping it a little bit, and I remember going up that Corkscrew thinking, ‘Jesus and Heaven above, let these work.’ And boy did they work. It stopped so well. It was very, very pleasing and satisfying how late I could brake in this—what is a relatively heavy car. It’s light for a Camaro, a supercharged Camaro. A bad driver could crash it immediately, but for a reasonable guy who can drive really fast and doesn’t need stability control, this is the ultimate pony car right now.” 2018 Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 (1LE) POWERTRAIN/CHASSIS DRIVETRAIN LAYOUT Front-engine, RWD ENGINE TYPE Supercharged 90-deg V-8, alum block/heads VALVETRAIN OHV, 2 valves/cyl DISPLACEMENT 376.1 cu in/6,162 cc COMPRESSION RATIO 10.0:1 POWER (SAE NET) 650 hp @ 6,400 rpm* TORQUE (SAE NET) 650 lb-ft @ 3,600 rpm* REDLINE 6,500 rpm WEIGHT TO POWER 5.9 lb/hp TRANSMISSION 6-speed manual AXLE/FINAL-DRIVE RATIO 3.73:1/2.00:1 SUSPENSION, FRONT; REAR Struts, coil springs, anti-roll bar; multilink, coil springs, adj anti-roll bar STEERING RATIO 11.1:1-15.1:1 TURNS LOCK-TO-LOCK 2.3 BRAKES, F; R 15.4-in vented, 2-pc disc; 14.4-in vented, 2-pc disc, ABS WHEELS 11.0 x 20-in; 12.0 x 20-in, forged aluminum TIRES 305/30R19 98Y; 325/30R19 101Y Goodyear Eagle F1 Supercar 3R (Tread 100) DIMENSIONS WHEELBASE 110.7 in TRACK, F/R 64.1/62.8 in LENGTH x WIDTH x HEIGHT 188.3 x 74.7 x 52.0 in TURNING CIRCLE 38.7 ft CURB WEIGHT 3,837 lb WEIGHT DIST, F/R 55/45% SEATING CAPACITY 4 HEADROOM, F/R 38.5/33.5 in LEGROOM, F/R 43.9/29.9 in SHOULDER ROOM, F/R 55.0/50.4 in CARGO VOLUME 9.1 cu ft TEST DATA ACCELERATION TO MPH 0-30 1.6 sec 0-40 2.2 0-50 2.8 0-60 3.6 0-70 4.4 0-80 5.3 0-90 6.6 0-100 7.9 0-100-0 11.3 PASSING, 45-65 MPH 1.5 QUARTER MILE 11.7 sec @ 123.0 mph BRAKING, 60-0 MPH 91 ft LATERAL ACCELERATION 1.11 g (avg) MT FIGURE EIGHT 23.0 sec @ 0.93 g (avg) 2.2-MI ROAD COURSE LAP 1:34.30 sec TOP-GEAR REVS @ 60 MPH 1,900 rpm CONSUMER INFO BASE PRICE $71,295 PRICE AS TESTED $73,090 STABILITY/TRACTION CONTROL Yes/Yes AIRBAGS 8: Dual front, front side, f/r curtain, front knee BASIC WARRANTY 3 yrs/36,000 miles POWERTRAIN WARRANTY 5 yrs/60,000 miles ROADSIDE ASSISTANCE 5 yrs/60,000 miles FUEL CAPACITY 19.0 gal EPA CITY/HWY/COMB ECON 14/20/16 mpg ENERGY CONS, CITY/HWY 241/169 kW-hrs/100 miles CO2 EMISSIONS, COMB 1.20 lb/mile RECOMMENDED FUEL Unleaded premium The post Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 1LE: 4th Place – 2017 Motor Trend Best Driver’s Car appeared first on Motor Trend.

http://www.motortrend.com/news/chevrolet-camaro-zl1-1le-4th-place-2017-best-drivers-car/

[kerdasoftech]

DIGITAL MARKETING TRENDS THAT YOU CAN NO MORE OVERLOOK IN 2019

As 2019 approaches, the digital marketing landscape which includes SEO, social media, PPC, content marketing, email marketing is testifying a dramatic shift. Gone are the days when you can dismiss the visual search or artificial intelligence as a super hit science fiction contrivance.

There is much latest digital marketing trends that are developing in the contemporary high-tech, internet-connected world, and businesses should use them at the earliest as the trends which worked last the year will not yield the same result this year.

To help your business in deciding the trajectory for itself, we have listed a few latest digital marketing trends to take advantage to revamp your marketing strategy and match the desired business goal.

1.      VOICE SEARCH

Voice search has seen unprecedented popularity in recent year. According to the Comscore, by 2020, 50% of all the queries will be voice-based. Voice search is mainly of two types: First, smart speakers implementations such as Apple Home pod, Google Home, Amazon Alexa and Microsoft’s Cortana, which give a voice answer to the question, and secondly those which are installed on a smartphone such as Google Assistant, Siri, and desktop which display written search results.

Leading brands are now making efforts to know how to offer their promises through voice-enabled devices as they are more cost feasible and give greater capabilities than other marketing means.

A Business must concentrate on its outreach goals through voice engine optimization. A marketer should use content in natural language which means what words a customer would use for searching a product.

As a result, a business can leverage the opportunity to offer more specific content to accelerate the click-through rates.

2.      INTERNET BEATING TELEVISION

According to research, the internet will catch up to the television in 2019 in terms of numbers of hours watched. Research shows that people will spend 2.6 hours per day online, and 2.7 hours per day watching YouTube in 2019. This predicts that a user will spend less time on television as compared to web video, social media, and web ads.

3.      GROWING INTEGRATION OF SOCIAL MEDIA INTO OTHER SERVICES

Social media networks are continually merging and fusing their services with other third-party applications. For example, LinkedIn and Facebook give third-party service and share the data of the user account.

It is expected that this trend will carry on with unabated fury and integrate the other services. The social media applications may start sharing more user data and information with their target audiences, which in turn creates a more pleasant experience across third-party apps. This is conducive for social media networks to retain their supremacy and extract more information about users and cater better services to smaller websites and applications.

4.      CONTENT MARKETING

Content marketing always creates a strong impression and impact on the consumer mind, because of the exposure and backlinks it provides for a brand. Writing interesting content followed with brilliant marketing to influence customers is a big win-win situation for any business.  

Having a profound, more comprehensive understanding of the target customer and being able to hit the market with more precision is the growing trend of effective marketing. While the general content is always important, the specialized content of any particular industry can also produce a staggering outcome.

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5.      ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE

This year, Artificial intelligence is pulling its weight in the marketing world by powering customer segmentation, push notifications, retargeting, click tracking and so many other things in a limitless combination of possibilities, which includes content too.

How to use a digital marketing portfolio depends upon the business goals and the channels. A business is likely to fail behind if it is not leveraging AI in its marketing intelligence.

As per the study by Blueshift, 28% of marketers are leveraging the AI product recommendations and 26% for campaign optimization.

Apart from increasing the sale, AI can help in ameliorating the customer service.

As per the Forrester’s Global State of Artificial Intelligence Online Survey, 57% of the businesses are using AI to enrich their client experience, while 44% are utilizing for revamping upon existing products and services.

It enables a business to personalize the marketing to each leads to turn it into a sales qualified lead.

6.      MICRO-MOMENTS

Nowadays, most of the users are processing their online activities via their mobile devices and as such marketers are now taking advantage of the micro-moments to attract more audience attention and meet their instant desires.

People on average spend 3 hours and 35 minutes on their mobile devices every day, and by 2019, a smartphone will be the only medium which will get the most minutes.

Micro-moments are consumer behavior which help in delivering the marketing message clearly and succinctly within a fraction of a second.

To leverage the micro-moments in 2019, a marketer needs to track all the search engines where a consumer might search for information like Google map, Amazon, YouTube, etc.

7.      AUGMENTED AND VIRTUAL REALITY MARKETING

Augmented reality ads are one of the latest applications used by marketers to bring the static and unreal environment into a more real experience to integrate the “offer” with the “reality” of the buyer. According to the Statists, AR and VR market is going to reach $209.2 billion worldwide within 4 years.

8.      EMAIL MARKETING FOR BOOSTING ENGAGEMENT

As email marketing is getting more aggressive these days, marketers have started delivering emails to their perspective and active subscriber. But for sending the right emails to the right audience segments is a daunting task as it needs a thorough dissection of the lead’s behavior.

If the platforms they are using have certain restrictions to classify their target subscriber into different segments according to their behavior then, in that case, they can integrate some tools to allow them to do this; marketer will be able to target their lead, once they decide the data and information and  develop different categories for defining criteria.

To reinforce a more customized and tailored the manifestation of delivering emails based on engagement.

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9.      INFLUENCER MARKETING

Influencer marketing is a type of word-of-mouth marketing that concentrates on the influential people or celebrities to drive the brand message to a larger cohort of the targeted audience, and not directly pitching the client for the products. It is one of the most effective marketing tools as people generally trust consumer opinions than corporate advertisements.

10.  PUSH NOTIFICATIONS

Push notification is one of the most popular web development trends in 2019.  Businesses are using push notifications to expand their leads in a more efficacious way to integrate with the target clients.

It is highly instrumental in retaining clients and ameliorating conversion rates. For example, e-commerce companies use a browser push for retargeting the customers who have abandoned their shopping carts and lures them to buy the product which they did not buy but had earlier added to their cart.

CONCLUSION

The year 2019 will be about enhanced and enriched client experience with customization, personalization, automation, and AI-powered technologies, to stay ahead of the competitors and amplify the conversions. A plethora of content is floating amid Google algorithm changes, strategies and set up to make use of AI for imagining, marketing, repurposing email a nurturing tool, a thoughtful positioning to leverage the potential in push notifications… and the list goes on and on.

SO, now since you know what are the digital marketing trends for 2019, what are your strategies in the coming year?

[talkingsquidphd]

Review: Clifford D. Simak, “Time and Again”

For almost a decade, my father and I have been playing this game where he recommends me an amazing piece of pulpy retro sf and then, caught in the rush of work and the vicissitudes of life, it takes me about two years to read it because I only seem to “have time” during holidays and breaks. The first was The Space Merchants (1953), a brilliant, biting novel co-written by the inimitable duo of Frederik Pohl and C.M. Kornbluth which was brutally satirizing 1950s advertising and consumer culture way before Mad Men made it cool. Issued mid-high school, I managed to squeeze it in between my senior year AP exams and the start of my post-graduation summer job. The second was Gateway (1977), also penned by Pohl, whose dual story threads tracked a dangerous Russian roulette-like space exploration program and the psychotherapy sessions of a traumatized former explorer. With an original loan date in the summer just before I left for my junior year study abroad, fate eventually intervened and put it on the syllabus to a class I was taking… in my first semester of graduate school. The latest was Clifford D. Simak’s Time and Again (1951), which, after the customary two years gathering dust beside my books for work, I finally managed to finish when a bomb cyclone and ensuing polar vortex shut down life in the Northeast US as we know it.

To the untrained (read: ungenerous) eye, Time and Again is a typical 50s sf yarn with a mystery premise like something out of Jonathan Creek. Twenty years ago, burly white male protagonist du jour Asher Sutton was sent to recon a mysterious planet. In the present, with no warning or explanation, Sutton’s ship returns to Earth, battered beyond repair but still somehow flying. Based on calculations by the boys in the lab, there’s no scientifically explicable way Sutton could have survived the destruction of the ship and the trip back to Earth. So how, asks the dust jacket, is he back, seemingly alive and well? It’s the kind of question entirely typical of sf at this time – how did our intrepid Campbell-esque engineer hero MacGyver his way out of certain death using only his wits and good old science? It, in turn, begs the kind of answer you’d have to animatedly diagram on a napkin while babbling about mirrors and ricochet effects and tricks of the light.

And yet Time and Again almost immediately undercuts this mystery when it admits the answer practically on the first page: Sutton didn’t survive. He died, and a mystical force – a secondary being tagging along in his consciousness that Sutton nicknames “Johnny” – is responsible for bringing him back from the dead. Thrust suddenly into a world where inexplicable Powers That Be can do everything from read and influence the thoughts of others to reverse death and travel through time, Sutton find himself an engineer in a world where science and deductive reasoning counts for very little anymore. In fact, every time Sutton thinks he’s figured something out and acts decisively based on that logic, he’s smacked mockingly in the face by the unreality of his situation. Bouncing from incorrect supposition to incorrect supposition, trying to piece together a complex time-travel paradox in between being drugged, knocked out, beaten up, shot, and even killed a few times, Sutton is an early sf protagonist deeply disenfranchised and wholly at the mercy of the plot.

This, believe it or not, feeds into the central focus of the novel, which is destiny. In Time and Again’s 74th century, capital-m Mankind is very much on the back foot and trying to get back on the front foot by following a twisted version of manifest destiny and colonizing the whole universe. But with so few actual Men left and so many stars yet to conquer, Man has no choice but to create “androids” (not robots, deceptively, but clones) to artificially swell his numbers and provide better universe coverage. Treated like second-class citizens, the beleaguered androids are now making a subtle bid for abolition and legitimacy. What does all this have to do with Sutton, you ask? From his trip to the mysterious planet, Sutton draws a profound epiphany about destiny – that every living thing has a destiny and striking a balance between accepting and questioning one’s destiny is the true route to happiness. Returning to Earth, Sutton plans to write the self-help book to end all self-help books espousing this philosophy of destiny. From clues and individuals sent back in time from the future, Sutton realizes his book has become the ultimate hit – it’s started a war between a faction of android rights activists holding it up as a doctrine of equality and a cadre of Men dead-set on annotating the hell out of it in a Revised edition that reaffirms manly Men’s supremacy. In the middle of it all is Sutton, who in the present day is forced to dodge deadly assassins and seriously pushy book agents alike despite the fact he hasn’t even written the book yet.

Like the twist answer to the dust jacket question, this dilemma of the future war and the book’s effect on it has a sort of swerve ending that I love. Without giving away too much, I’d say Time and Again above all preaches the long game – evolution, not revolution. While the lot of androids is pretty bleak in the novel’s present, Sutton’s doctrine of destiny for all living things – both born and created – promises to significantly influence the thought of the universe in favor of equality and understanding. But, as controversial and dangerous as the book seems to its enemies and naysayers, that’s all it is – a sizeable drop and ensuing ripples in a steadily gathering pool of sentiment which will one day overflow its container. And while this kind of slow progress towards a distant goal of understanding can be frustrating and disheartening in its slowness, Time and Again at least offers the comforting inevitability that the arc of the universe bends towards justice, which is relatively refreshing compared to the “we’re all doomed and that’s all she wrote” noble pessimism of so much contemporary sf.

Aside from the unexpected flouting of Occam’s Razor in the book’s initial mystery, the novel’s most left-field aspect is its deep reverence for untampered nature, glimpsed on Sutton’s visits to the distant past of his ancestors living in scenic Bridgeport, Wisconsin. Having grown up on an Earth so relentlessly manicured it’s like something out of Marvell’s mower poems, Sutton joins in with the mower in mourning the fact that everything about the planet, from the landscape to the weather, seems rustic and hardy but is in fact precisely controlled, and not one thing on the planet is for industry rather than pleasure. Disagreeing with Man’s addiction to pleasure and ease of life as much as their perverse doctrine of manifest destiny, Sutton appreciates the pastoral pleasures of farm life and hard work, waxing poetic about them for paragraphs at a time:

There were times when the work, not only for its sedative effect but for its very self, became a thing of interest and of satisfaction. The straight line of new-set fence posts became a minor triumph when one glanced back along their length. The harvest field, with its dust upon one’s hoes and its smell of sun on golden straw and the clacking of a binder as it went its rounds, became a full-breasted symbolism of plenty and contentment. And there were moments when the pink blush of apple blossoms shining through the silver rain of spring became a wild and pagan paean of the resurrection of the earth from the frosts of winter. For six days a man would labor and not have time to think; on the seventh day he rested and braced himself for the loneliness and the thoughts of desperation that idleness would bring. (226-227)

Time and Again has of course got some problems, especially problems reminiscent of its distant ancestors – for example, a Blade-Runner-esque female character who initially seems powerful, well-informed, and key to the plot, but whose role, after infodumping all her expertise onto the male protagonist, devolves into merely pining for him. And for a novel which hangs its central premise on a text preaching the equality and oneness of all things, Asher Sutton playing human savior to the novel’s disenfranchised Other seems a contradictory misstep at important moments. Only the fact that Sutton, himself now something more/less/Other than human, is bumbling and utterly clueless, being dragged along by fate, manipulated by a vast network of spies, and punished whenever he thinks he’s got things figured out, keeps him from devolving into the self-righteous figure who thinks he knows the lot of the suffering better than those suffering themselves. As a result, Time and Again comes off as a subversive, self-deprecating, oddball 1950s pulp constantly toeing the line between having big brilliant ideas and overreaching.

[vrheadsets]

Bebylon Battle Royale Part of Epic Games’ Latest Unreal Dev Grants

American developer Kite and Lightning hasn’t yet released it’s long awaited virtual reality (VR) title Bebylon Battle Royale but it is still being awarded funding for the project, this time through Epic Games and its Unreal Dev Grant programme.

Every so often Epic Games announces a new raft of dev grants for indie studios that use Unreal Engine for their projects. This new round has seen over $200,000 USD being awarded to a mixture of developers, with Kite & Lightning being the only one making a VR videogame.

Bebylon Battle Royale’s core gameplay revolves around a multiplayer combat arena where you control babies who fight it out for supremacy with customisable vehicles and weapons to play with. There’s more to the experience than just fighting however, with the studio creating an entire virtual world in which to explore. The title also made VRFocus’ The Best HTC Vive Games Coming in 2018 list.

“Unreal Dev Grants is our way to reward and highlight the incredible talent that makes up the Unreal development community,” said Chance Ivey, Partnership Manager, Epic Games in a statement. “These projects show what is possible when you combine passion with creative technology, and stand as examples of why we do what we do.”

Established in February 2015, Unreal Dev Grants is a $5 million development fund that supported many a VR developer in its time. These have included: Cooperative Innovations’ Raiders of Erda; The Soulkeeper VR by Helm Systems; Ape Law’s psychological horror title Albino Lullaby; Carbon Studio’s Alice VR and Kenzan Studios’ The Fantastic Voyages of Teo and  Leonie to name a few.

While Bebylon Battle Royale may have been the only VR title on the list, an augmented reality (AR) experience also made the grade. Originally revealed back in September 2017, The Machines comes from Chinese studio Directive Games Limited. It’s a MOBA-inspired AR PVP game where players build an army of robots and duke it out with a friend in-person or online.

As new grants are awarded by Epic Games, VRFocus will keep you updated on the latest VR titles making the grade.

from VRFocus http://ift.tt/2DchqlC

[robertkstone]

Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 1LE: 4th Place – 2017 Motor Trend Best Driver’s Car

We’ve all heard about the bad old days at GM when no car was allowed to challenge the Corvette’s performance supremacy. Those days are long dead. Team Camaro has applied its 1LE handling philosophy to the monstrously powerful ZL1, and the resulting monster is the most track-capable road car GM has ever sold.

Up front, the standard Camaro ZL1’s 6.2-liter supercharged V-8 still makes 650 horsepower and 650 lb-ft of torque because frankly it didn’t need to make more. Being an enthusiast’s car, a six-speed manual is the only transmission on offer. An electronically controlled differential rounds out the powertrain. Out at the corners, magnetic shocks are replaced with Multimatic spool-valve shocks, and like the rest of the suspension, they’re hard-mounted with metal bushings, not rubber. The ride height, front camber, and rear anti-roll bar are all manually adjustable. A bigger grille improves cooling, and dive planes on the front corners and a massive rear wing provide downforce across the car. Equally massive carbon-ceramic brakes do the stopping.

It’s Best Driver’s Car week! Don’t miss the incredible story of how we chose the 2017 Best Driver’s Car right here, and stay tuned for the World’s Greatest Drag Race, coming soon.

Put it all together, nail the launch, and you’ll see 60 mph in 3.6 seconds and an 11.7-second quarter mile at 123 mph flat. Going the other way, the 3,837-pound ZL1 1LE will stop from 60 mph in a scant 91 feet. Put it on a skidpad, and it’ll pull 1.11 average g. Fling it at the figure eight, and you’ll get a 23.0-second lap at 0.93 average g.

We Say

“This car needs five-point harnesses because the dampers are so unforgiving. It’s true this 1LE has incredible grip; however, the compression damping is way too harsh while the rebound damping is just right. I’m not sure where they tuned this, but it clearly did not have a lot of bumps and jumps. The steering is freakishly quick. It took me three corners to calm my hands down, so I didn’t steer into and across the apex. The power seems to be well matched for the chassis, for a change, unlike the Z06. Third gear seemed very tractable and had a wide bandwidth. This feels like what I imagine a ’60s-’70s Trans Am car would be like.” – Chris Walton

“I know Jonny loves this car, but I just can’t warm to it. Probably because I’ve lost all my fillings, and my kidneys are bruised. With the exception of the best roads, the ride in this Camaro is punishing. I’ve encountered smoother paint mixers. I had to remind myself that based on the numbers, this car is fantastic. Endless grip, fade-free brakes, abundant horsepower. But the thing is, I didn’t care. The bouncing was so bad that I found myself reacting to that instead of focusing on sheer act of driving. The Camaro might be brilliant on the track, but I wouldn’t want to drive this to get there.” – Derek Powell

Read about other 2017 Best Driver’s Car contenders:

Ferrari 488 GTB

Porsche 911 Turbo S

Porsche 718 Cayman S

Lexus LC 500

Mercedes-AMG GT R

Alfa Romeo Giulia Quadrifoglio

Chevrolet Corvette Grand Sport

Aston Martin DB11

Nissan GT-R NISMO

Mazda MX-5 Miata RF

McLaren 570GT

“Simply tremendous … tremendous grip, tremendous brakes, and tremendous power. And how about that third pedal? This added that special connection to the vehicle that the Ferrari or 911 Turbo simply can’t match, which is why I ranked it higher than those two fancy (and expensive) machines. With the Camaro, I felt like I—not some fancy software—had a big part in conquering 198.” – Erick Ayapana

“That’s a driver’s car! When the aero and the tires shake hands, it’s a moment of revelation. You are suddenly driving a hard-mounted race car. Unreal. So much power, so much control, so much stopping ability. An absolute monster of a machine. This is an uncaged race car. Being able to actually use all 650 horsepower and 650 lb-ft of torque is mind-boggling. I’m not sure how this car isn’t a podium finisher.” – Jonny Lieberman

“Long name, amazing results! Everywhere a competitor put a wheel in the air, the Camaro stuck like glue. There’s a lot of vertical movement in the cabin, but the car just sticks no matter what. It never jumps sideways a foot when it hits a mid-corner bump, never moves around laterally at all. Even when it feels like you’ve carried too much speed into a corner, it sticks. I can’t count how many times I put the throttle flat on the floor. In a 650-hp car this stiff on this bumpy road, that’s seriously impressive. The eLSD takes a little getting used to. If you start to feed in power mid-corner, the car turns in more as the diff gets to work. Steer with the throttle? Yes, please!

“Brakes have huge stopping power and great pedal feel. Squeeze, don’t stomp, and get exactly what you want.

“I thought this car would be too stiff for the road, and that’s coming from someone who drove the Z/28 for a year. I was wrong.” – Scott Evans

Randy Says

“It was not perfectly balanced for me. I’m really trying to smear a little lipstick from the perfection here, but it would go from a little teeny bit of understeer, which was perfect, to a little bit of oversteer, which is almost perfect. But when we put it in the context of what it is, which is a front-engine rear-drive car with 650 horsepower, the traction was incredible. It put down power extremely well, I could drive it with everything turned off, and for me, that’s just so much more satisfying.

“The dampers felt great. Basically I never thought about it. Which means nothing came into my awareness as being, oh, this is too stiff. Or that is too soft. I don’t sense roll. So when I just turn for the corner, it just lies over there. That’s not good terminology because I don’t feel it roll. I’m sure it does, but I don’t feel it. Which means it’s got good damping. When I’m down in the corner, in the middle, I still have a steering response, and I can still tighten it up.

“It was happy coming out of the corkscrew. That’s always hard in a powerful rear drive car. Put the power down. When you’re in a low gear and it’s a hard right. It wants to power oversteer. But this one was pretty damn good. Especially at that power level. See, we have to keep this in context.

“The car generated a tremendous amount of braking force, but for the first time in any high-performance Camaro, it had a long pedal. I was pumping it a little bit, and I remember going up that Corkscrew thinking, ‘Jesus and Heaven above, let these work.’ And boy did they work. It stopped so well. It was very, very pleasing and satisfying how late I could brake in this—what is a relatively heavy car. It’s light for a Camaro, a supercharged Camaro. A bad driver could crash it immediately, but for a reasonable guy who can drive really fast and doesn’t need stability control, this is the ultimate pony car right now.”

2018 Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 (1LE) POWERTRAIN/CHASSIS DRIVETRAIN LAYOUT Front-engine, RWD ENGINE TYPE Supercharged 90-deg V-8, alum block/heads VALVETRAIN OHV, 2 valves/cyl DISPLACEMENT 376.1 cu in/6,162 cc COMPRESSION RATIO 10.0:1 POWER (SAE NET) 650 hp @ 6,400 rpm* TORQUE (SAE NET) 650 lb-ft @ 3,600 rpm* REDLINE 6,500 rpm WEIGHT TO POWER 5.9 lb/hp TRANSMISSION 6-speed manual AXLE/FINAL-DRIVE RATIO 3.73:1/2.00:1 SUSPENSION, FRONT; REAR Struts, coil springs, anti-roll bar; multilink, coil springs, adj anti-roll bar STEERING RATIO 11.1:1-15.1:1 TURNS LOCK-TO-LOCK 2.3 BRAKES, F; R 15.4-in vented, 2-pc disc; 14.4-in vented, 2-pc disc, ABS WHEELS 11.0 x 20-in; 12.0 x 20-in, forged aluminum TIRES 305/30R19 98Y; 325/30R19 101Y Goodyear Eagle F1 Supercar 3R (Tread 100) DIMENSIONS WHEELBASE 110.7 in TRACK, F/R 64.1/62.8 in LENGTH x WIDTH x HEIGHT 188.3 x 74.7 x 52.0 in TURNING CIRCLE 38.7 ft CURB WEIGHT 3,837 lb WEIGHT DIST, F/R 55/45% SEATING CAPACITY 4 HEADROOM, F/R 38.5/33.5 in LEGROOM, F/R 43.9/29.9 in SHOULDER ROOM, F/R 55.0/50.4 in CARGO VOLUME 9.1 cu ft TEST DATA ACCELERATION TO MPH 0-30 1.6 sec 0-40 2.2 0-50 2.8 0-60 3.6 0-70 4.4 0-80 5.3 0-90 6.6 0-100 7.9 0-100-0 11.3 PASSING, 45-65 MPH 1.5 QUARTER MILE 11.7 sec @ 123.0 mph B from PerformanceJunk WP Feed 3 http://ift.tt/2fiGOzi via IFTTT

[nofomoartworld]

Hyperallergic: The Possibilities and Failures of the Racial Imagination

Claudia Rankine introducing the April 9 event at the Whitney Museum (photo by Jillian Steinhauer/Hyperallergic)

Over the past few weeks, the conversation and controversy surrounding Dana Schutz’s painting of a photograph of the lynched Emmett Till, “Open Casket” — currently on view in the Whitney Biennial — has engulfed the art world. The Whitney Museum presented a public response on Sunday night, April 9, co-hosted by the writer Claudia Rankine’s Racial Imaginary Institute. For the event, 14 speakers, including the two curators of the biennial, Christopher Y. Lew and Mia Locks, were invited to give brief meditations on anything related to the topic at hand — Schutz’s painting, Emmett Till and his mother, Mamie Till-Mobley, white supremacy, institutional responsibility. The three of us attended, and we found it, by turns, intriguing, depressing, boring, and exhilarating. We left wanting to talk more about this idea of the racial imagination and, in the case of the Schutz debacle, its failure.

*   *   *

Chloë Bass: This conversation is situated around the idea of the imaginary: The Whitney event was hosted by the Racial Imaginary Institute, which claims to operate in the service of  recognizing race as a powerful construct. It addressed the imagination of an artist, Dana Schutz, which has been tagged in this case as a “failure of empathy,” and folded together the ruptures of imagination that have accompanied responses to her painting. (One clear example is the dangerous comparison of Hannah Black’s call for destruction to censorship perpetuated by the state. This is a powerful idea that we know for a fact to be false, yet it continues to circulate.)

I wanted to ask the panelists, but didn’t, what imaginaries they hope to perpetuate or produce through the execution of an exhibit. What imaginaries are perpetuated or produced through the formulation and maintenance of an institution like a museum? What are the limits or hopes of our own imaginations in response to this controversy and its outcomes?

I also want to talk about economic imaginaries: so much of the outcry around this work is, I think, a product of our ideas of value and the seemingly “neutral” value that the museum provides for a work. This neutral value is, of course, both not neutral at all — we know that museum exhibits are funded in large part by commercial galleries and private collectors so as to add a sense of intellectual worth to works already owned and up for sale — and also highly monetized. Dana Schutz stating that her painting is not for sale misses the point entirely: transactions of worth are built on imaginaries, just as the continued non-abstract violence that happens to Black bodies is built on a certain kind of imaginary. Both can be made real in a single instance (the sale of a painting, the destruction of a body) that sets a precedent for a longer-term operation of the same function (the worth of Schutz’s work going forward, the continued murder of many Black bodies). Nothing in this conversation exists in a single instance.

At the Whitney, a protest against Dana Schutz' painting of Emmett Till: "She has nothing to say to the Black community about Black trauma." http://pic.twitter.com/C6x1JcbwRa

— Scott W. H. Young (@hei_scott) March 17, 2017

Seph Rodney: Having read Chloë’s start to our conversation, I realized that I wasn’t sure what an “imaginary” actually is. I ran to a dictionary for the intellectual comfort of leaning on an authoritative text. Apparently, an imaginary is simply the product of the imagination, that which is unreal. The definitive article “the” in this definition gets to me. I think it’s not necessarily my imagination, because, as Chloë says, “Nothing in this conversation exists in a single instance”; the imaginary is suite of shared, circulating ideas. There are many of these: familial, religious, the tandem series of speculations and fantasies that I share with someone I love. There are the imaginaries I’ve inherited, of which James Baldwin recently reminded me, via director Raoul Peck’s documentary I Am Not Your Negro. Baldwin convincingly argued that the shared, productive imagination that generated the idea of a “nigger” (in which many of us trade) is completely damning: it damns the people (and their progeny, genetic and intellectual) to never grow up or become full people; it damns the future of this nation; it damns me in ways that should be fairly obvious by now. It damned Emmett Till.

I wonder what good it does to point out the failure of the imaginaries already present when I walk into a room. I mean, I know there is an ethical and emotional catharsis when I fire up my engines of indignation and let fly. I remember, as an MFA student at UC Irvine, listening to Daniel J. Martinez on one of his magnificently polemical diatribes, asking a group of seminar students why it was that, despite sustained critique by several generations of artists, the system for production of art seemed to nevertheless be increasingly shaped by a neoliberal worldview. It just came out of me, unexpectedly: “that’s because of the poverty of your imagination.” I think I meant his generation, or the UCI fine arts faculty and students, which at the time maintained a kind of smug criticality.

So I recall this and think of the dry, emaciated joy that I can get from pointing to a failure, especially a public one. There are so many ways our collective imaginary constructs have let us down that become more visible in this Whitney debacle. Chloë has indicated some in the above, and I agree with her that the painter paid insufficient attention to the primacy of her work’s content over her own practiced, formalist approach, and that Hannah Black failed to recognize that her call to destroy the work was far too self-serving, opposing what she structures as a weak and apologist position against one that is tyrannical and vindictive. There are other failures: On Sunday, Christopher Lew couldn’t or wouldn’t find a way to say something that sounded genuine, rather than a PR-vetted statement that served as institutional deflection in the guise of championing an open exchange of ideas and art’s willingness to be controversial. His colleague, Mia Locks, was a little better, though she offered only the meager opportunity to reach out and talk with her about the exhibition. Then, there is the failure of the Whitney to have meaningfully dealt with issues of representation in its exhibitions since, as Lyle Ashton Harris and Lorraine O’Grady pointed out, the 1994 Black Male show, which seemed at that bright moment to add a new paragraph to the script of crucially important museum shows.

Fred Wilson’s “Guarded View” (1991) was included in the Whitney’s 1994 Black Male exhibition. It’s shown here in the museum’s inaugural exhibition in its new home in 2015, America Is Hard to See. (photo by Jillian Steinhauer/Hyperallergic)

There is also a generational failure: those artists and teachers who believed that sustained critique allied to aesthetic production could point the way out of a racist, classist, misogynist, homophobic wilderness. They didn’t imagine that destabilizing notions of authoritative history and throwing institutions and even the notion of truth into question would not prevent angry, organized conservatives from grasping power in government and civic institutions and using that power to ratify white supremacy. They didn’t anticipate critique’s failure to prevent aesthetic production from being colonized by the market, which conditions our relations to be competitive and instrumentalist. So many failures. My throat gets thicker as I write this, because I am truly exhausted by our collective failures, and my own failure to somehow see beyond the mountains of debris around me.

Does it help that I can still envision what success would look like: an art production system uncoupled from the need to buy and sell and from the urgency to satisfy one’s ego, and a robust and genuinely respectful civic arena for public conversation, where we prioritize actually seeing and recognizing each other? It feels like a kilo of salt on my tongue as I try to articulate the term “imaginary” and wonder why we fail even in our thoughts (where we might be most free).

Jillian Steinhauer: First off, I want to say that both of you are extremely smart, and I am humbled to be having this conversation with you.

Probably because I’m white, what has struck me the most in almost every aspect of the Schutz debacle — from creation of painting to display to protest to aftermath — has been the failure of the white imagination. As Ryan Wong wrote in his brilliant piece for Hyperallergic, “Why do white artists think the only way you can discuss race is through the suffering of people of color?” It’s not just artists, but the vast majority of white people — we are able only to conceive of race as something that belongs or happens to people of color (I mean, look at the term “people of color”). Because we are taught, by white supremacy, that we are raceless, or post-race. So, you get someone like Schutz, but also many others before her, who think that the only way to engage with racial issues is to try to empathize with the position of a person of color — not to try to understand her own position as a white person. That’s the failure that is so crucial to me: not recognizing that white supremacy renders whiteness invisible, and that undoing white supremacy means intervening in that quiet, nefarious process by naming whiteness — by recognizing and pointing out how it works and our own relationship to it.

Others have said this in different ways, and I agree and want to restate it here: what if, instead of painting Emmett Till, Dana Schutz had painted Carolyn Bryant, the white woman who knowingly, falsely accused Till of grabbing and threatening her? Is there some kind of constructive work a painting like that could do?

Dana Schutz’s “Open Casket” (2016) (photo by Benjamin Sutton/Hyperallergic)

The other glaring failure of the white imagination that I see here — both in Schutz and in the Whitney, which is, at the end of the day, a white institution, despite having enlisted two Asian Americans to curate the biennial — is the complete inability to foresee how Black viewers might respond to that painting. This failure is so absurd, honestly, that I find myself coming to the appalling conclusion that it might never have even occurred to Schutz or the higher-ups at the Whitney that Black viewers would see the painting. Because the presumed art audience is white. As you said, Chloë, we need to stop operating in the myth that museums are neutral spaces. “Neutral” usually means “white,” and white is a dangerous power construct.

To borrow Lyle Ashton Harris’s words from Sunday night, I have no interest in having a “kumbaya moment” here, but I’m curious if either of you sees any of the failures here as potentially productive or somehow offering a clue about how to move forward.

CB: I’ve said before, and am happy to say again here, that I don’t think the job of the artist is to invoke realities neither we nor our intended audience can imagine, and then expect to change the world. I don’t know for sure, but maybe that’s what Dana Schutz was hoping to do: take something that wasn’t hers (as opposed to the Carolyn Bryant story, which was definitely up for her grabs) and give it, through curators whose story this also wasn’t, to an institution that didn’t get it, to viewers that the institution assumed wouldn’t notice (and here I draw directly from your point about assuming there’s no Black audience, Jillian). All of these failed imaginings result in the continuation of a system that we know to fall short in dramatic and ongoing ways.

So this is where I want to add something new with regards to the question of responsibility: I don’t think this is about the Whitney at all. Neither do I think it’s about Dana Schutz, Hannah Black, or any of the other cast of characters who have spoken on this topic. I can imagine a world without all of these institutions and individuals. If I’m really being honest, the only person I can’t imagine the world without is myself (although it’s an interesting thought exercise). What this indicates to me is that responsibility starts with me. I see disavowing, or somehow unseeing, my own subject position as the beginning of a chain of wild inaccuracies. I might want a world where I ask other people to position themselves in the same way. I think many people do this, but it’s also an thing easy to forget when we’re working at the scale of tackling an entire system.

Seph and Jillian, you both make clear that wild white imaginations result in controlled death. I guess what I want to ask, or optimistically point to, as a first condition of improving our imaginations and their results, is where we permit violence in our own lives. How can we let go of the desperation and scarcity mentality that force us to keep relying on the Whitney, or any other institution, even when they fail us time and time again? Who are we hoping to please? I’m asking for a world where we give ourselves permission to move beyond these pale beliefs. I still believe in institutional accountability, but I also think we can do more than just exhaust ourselves with constant call-outs of a system that has built up centuries of defense against active listening. (Defenses, I might add, that we now mimic as individuals.)

Here’s one positive suggestion: what if white artists and institutions, instead of capitalizing on and re-airing Black pain, created space to celebrate Black joy (without capitalizing on it)? It doesn’t seem so hard to do this. I think we could all really be happy there. Black joy is expansive and resilient. If you think there’s no way to do this without capitalizing on it, then maybe the answers we’re looking for just aren’t able to exist in the places we’re looking.

SR: I am truly grateful to have this conversation with two women who are woke and who I can trust. Please know I appreciate that you are rare human beings. Most people I wouldn’t even broach this conversation with.

Two things come to mind in response to Chloë’s suggestion of responsibility beginning with the self, and her question as to why we continue to rely on consistently disappointing institutions. The first is: I disagree. I think responsibility precedes me. I enter into a culture where a set of politics already exists that encourages most people (even those who look like me) to dehumanize each other, to mistake each other for the sign of something else. I know that I am responsible for wringing whatever joy I can from the fruits I can reach, but damned if the orchard isn’t structured to make it hard to get to them.

The second is that I think we still need institutions, especially civic ones, because they allow private experience to rub up against public judgment. That’s how we lead lives where we are not so alone, either ensconced in the semi-private enclaves of the family or the culture of the place of employment. Civic space is crucial to allow us to grow.

Jillian’s suggestion (which was made by an audience member on Sunday as well) that the arts community think about dealing with perpetrators of violence rather than its victims is a good one. It’s about time we start doing that. Chloë might be suggesting that we form new institutions, ones that are responsive and meaningfully accountable — which is also a worthy goal, though I find that somewhat entrepreneurial spirit to not be where I am right now.

Right now, I don’t want to rush off to try to make it better. Right now I just want to sit with an acknowledgment of our failures and look at them, really look at them, and then perhaps be able to understand them.

JS: Seph, I admire your patience. Chloë, I admire your readiness to take yourself to task. I could stand to improve in both of those areas. I do agree with Seph that we need institutions, for better or for worse — and I think I see it as both: I believe in personal responsibility, but I also think holding institutions accountable is a key part of that. It’s important for me to work to understand my own shortcomings, failures, whiteness, privilege, but it’s equally important for me to take what I learn in that process and extend it out into the world. Sometimes I think I’m being hopelessly mainstream and naïve when I continually insist that we must work to challenge the system; other times I think it’s the only real shot we have. It’s interesting to note, in relation to this event, that Claudia Rankine did decide to start her own, alternative institution — the Racial Imaginary Institute — but for her first event, she chose to collaborate with a pre-existing institution, the Whitney Museum. That collaboration may have resulted in an event that was less incisive, less rigorous than it could have been without the Whitney’s involvement. But one could also argue that it was important to have such an event at the Whitney, because it gave the critiques leveled there (especially those against the museum itself) added weight.

Black Women Artists for Black Lives Matter at the New Museum (photo by Madeleine Hunt Ehrlich)

Chloë, when you mentioned Black joy, I immediately thought of the Black Women Artists for Black Lives Matter event at the New Museum last year. Seeing a white institutional space given over to Black joy left a deep, lasting impression and really opened up a space of imagination within me. It seems relevant to note that the event came about because the artist Simone Leigh, who had her own show at the New Museum, took the initiative of proposing it — she was willing to cede some of her personal limelight to a larger cause. Maybe that’s the place where personal responsibility intersects with the institutional. An artist must think about not just what they paint, but also the ethical implications of how they interact with the world. (This is perhaps why I loved Ajay Kurian’s contribution on Sunday night — he’s an artist in the Whitney Biennial who is not afraid to criticize the show or the institution that’s hosting him.) In doing so, they may be able to think more imaginatively about the possibilities of that interaction.

I keep thinking that it feels unfair to lay all of this at the feet of individual artists (and writers, curators, etc). At the end of the day, we’re all trying to make a creative living (which is next to impossible) within the confines of the system we’ve been given. But the problem, of course, is that the system will never imagine anything beyond itself — and the system is, ultimately, comprised of people. So maybe the ideas that this comes down to personal vs. institutional responsibility are not actually opposed — maybe they’re one and the same … or at least, they’re related.

CB: One of the speakers last Sunday mentioned not confusing David with Goliath. That is essential here as well. While I think the format of institutional responsibility and personal responsibility can (or should?) be the same, the former is a greater, more aggregated, and more powerful form of the latter. The scales are not comparable.

I also just want to say, as we close out, that I appreciate very much that we’re not in total agreement. That feels important to me. I want to provide and be a part of more atmospheres where nuanced non-agreement can take place. For me, that celebration of the potential of real imagination, and the resulting dialogue, is the most important step towards any true change.

JS: Agreed wholeheartedly — I think a lot of the Schutz fallout has been the product of non-nuanced non-agreement, to use a double negative. I keep finding myself unsatisfied with such an inconclusive ending to our conversation, but it probably helps to remember that we are only three of the many people who’ve had and will continue to have it. If these questions were resolved, we wouldn’t need to keep asking them.

SR: Yes. I’m with both of you in spirit and in truth. We don’t need to fully agree — as long as we can create collaborations of productive tension (institutions might want to consider this, if they haven’t yet). In this season of real, demonstrable threat to our imaginations and lives, it feels right to end this conversation inconclusively but with the conviction that we are going to argue while still holding each other’s hands.

The 2017 Whitney Biennial continues at the Whitney Museum of American Art (99 Gansevoort Street, Meatpacking District, Manhattan) through June 11.

The post The Possibilities and Failures of the Racial Imagination appeared first on Hyperallergic.

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[nofomoartworld]

In 2065, a Military Satellite Becomes Self-Aware—and Wants to Become an Artist

While many artificial intelligence critics busy themselves getting terrified over the possibility of a Matrix-type scenario wherein AIs overthrow humanity for Earthly supremacy, others are exploring a more nuanced point of view. Consider London-based artist Lawrence Lek a member of the latter camp. In Geomancer, a 45-minute film designed with the ever-unbelievable Unreal Engine, Lek imagines AI as not only potentially benevolent, but artistic, and in many other ways, even human-like. Geomancer follows a young military AI satellite that becomes self-aware, then decides to descend to Earth and become an artist. Geomancer, the satellite, touches down at the Singapore 2065 Centennial, a future where the country has survived climate change floods. But the AI isn't as unique as it thinks it is, since a mysterious group called the Sino-Futurists may have already beaten it to the punch.

After coming back down to Earth, Geomancer drifts through Singapore. There, it learns of art, human culture, and the Sinofuturists as it moves through a museum, interrogating an invisible AI curator and pondering life and art. It is also at the Centennial that Geomancer encounters Sim Singapore, a simulation of the city-state before the flood, which makes the viewer question whether Geomancer's sense of reality is real or virtual.

Lek says there are several strands to Geomancer. One is the way science fiction dramatizes the militarization of technology and the fears behind it. There is also the slightly different culture and geopolitical ideas behind what he calls Sinofuturism, the idea that Chinese technological development is actually a form of artificial intelligence, and the anxiety that this produces in other parts of the world. Yet another is the literary portrait he constructs in Geomancer through the heavy use of words—in this case, Geomancer's narration of self-discovery.

Over the last several years, Lek has used video game software as a narrative framework for his ideas, as well as to investigate the medium. Lek tells Creators that he is particularly interested in video games' first-person narration, and what the implications of a first person perspective mean in terms of narrative. This is why Geomancer looks like the cut-scenes from video games.

"There's a slight shift from the distance of the viewer to the embodiment of the viewer who is also the narrator, the reader, the viewer or the game player, where the world is rendered through their point of view," Lek says. "I'd created fictional artists before for other work set in the future, who are thinking about what what I'm thinking about today. So, I thought as a way to take this further, what if I use this non-human but intelligent narrator in a sort of bildungsroman or coming-of-age narrative?"

The AI's sense of self comes about in quite the opposite way from how it happens with humans. A newborn's sense organs help to eventually build memories, then the baby increasingly perceives things in relation to its past experiences. Ultimately, an identity is formed. With the being in Geomancer, its memory—of all things that could possibly be learned—is established immediately, followed by its perception.

"For an AI that has downloaded its memory from the Internet, it has total recall before reception," says Lek. "Is it all memory of itself or is it real-time perception? This has to do with simulation theory, which is woven into the fabric of the film itself."

"I don't think any consciousness, no matter how sophisticated, would be immune to some craving or yearning for something beyond its intelligence," he adds. "If a being had so much intelligence, memory, and the capacity to win at basically at any kind of game, I imagined what it would want is to throw it all of way—to just have luck as opposed to determinism."

Lek set Geomancer in Singapore because he's quite familiar with the city-state, but he also felt it was a good place to set a story about Sinofuturism. He was interested in utopia-as-an-island as well as Singapore as an island nation, which mirrors London's geographic situation, and these two countries' relationship between independence and isolationism.

"This rising nationalism that the film has undertones of and the search for independence in a post-colonial or a post-human world is really important, but taken too far it's basically another form of repressive fascism or superiority complex," says Lek. "So, I think a lot of the human fear is around the mirror image fear of our own inferiority complex compared to other nations, other lifeforms, other people, other races, and so on and so forth."

"My way of reflecting on all of these intense geopolitical situation is to think of the future, not so much from the human perspective but consciousness derived from human conflict, which is a very strange thing, I think."

Geomancer is currently installed at Jerwood Space in London until May 14th, 2017. It was commissioned for Jerwood/FVU Awards 2017: Neither One Thing or Another, supported by Jerwood Charitable Foundation and Film and Video Umbrella.

Click here to see more of Lawrence Lek's work.

Related:

Here's What Actually Goes into Creating Artificial Intelligence

Artificial Intelligence Controls These Surreal Virtual Realities

Experience British Art with Artificial Intelligence Technologies

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