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Facebook hopes its new AI moderation tools can further counter hate speech
Facebook has waged a long-fought and sometimes seemingly losing battle against hate speech and misinformation spreading across its platform. On Thursday, the company rolled out the latest implements of its automated anti-trolling arsenal in an effort to further curb bigots and bad actors on the site. The company’s CTO, Mike Schroepfer, noted that Facebook has taken a number proactive steps in the last year to combat hate speech and those efforts have already begun to show results.
Wearable tech will be everywhere at this year's Olympics
It's almost time. The 2016 summer Olympics are less than a week away, with the opening ceremony scheduled for August 5th. This year's event, which runs through August 21nd, takes place in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, where the organizers have reportedly struggled to prepare for the games. Whether Rio is ready or not, some of the world's best athletes will be there to compete for gold medals in just a few days. Naturally, technology will have a presence at the Olympics. That includes wearables designed to make life easier and safer for Olympians as well as others supposed to help in training. Read on in the gallery below to learn about eight different pieces of gear the athletes will be using.
Comcast's Rio portal is a good way to keep up with the Olympics
The Olympics are starting in a little over a month and Comcast has devised a way to watch pretty much every minute of them. Xfinity X1 customers -- roughly half of Comcast's user base -- will have access to a special "Front Row to Rio" portal through which they'll be able to watch live content from both NBC-affiliated networks and internet streams. But that's just the start.
Olympic-themed Apple Watch bands are only available in Rio
To celebrate the Olympic games, the Apple Watch is getting a series of commemorative straps that match the flags of 14 participating countries. GQ got the exclusive, saying that each model will set you back $49, and match the colors of the respective flags, such as the USA, Great Britain and New Zealand. Sprinter Trayvon Bromell (pictured) got his Team USA band a little earlier than everyone else, but it won't be that easy to imitate him. That's because the straps are only going to be sold in one Apple Store -- the Barra da Tijuca location in West Rio de Janeiro through the month of August. Yeah.
US rowers will get antimicrobial outfits to survive polluted Rio waters
The Rio Olympic and Paralympic games sound like more of a nightmare every day. After the National Institute of Health announced that they will study American athletes for probable Zika infection, textile engineers at Philadelphia University have made antimicrobial suits to protect US rowers from the sewage-filled water around the South American city. Unfortunately, they might not be a match for an environment with 1.7M times the level of viral presence considered "hazardous."
The Olympics will be shown in VR, but only on Samsung headsets
NBC began outlining its plans for broadcasting Rio 2016 yesterday, but a few more juicy tidbits have now filtered through. The AP (via ABC News) is reporting that around 85 hours of programming will be available to watch in VR, but only if you use Samsung's Gear VR. The brief report claims that the opening and closing ceremonies will get the 360-degree treatment, as will the men's basketball, gymnastics and track and field. Details beyond that brief outline are sketchy, although it's interesting that the footage is provided by a unit of the International Olympic Committee rather than the usual suspects, like NextVR. All of the content will be available on the NBC Sports app, assuming that you've got a Gear VR-compatible smartphone, of course.
ICYMI: Raining tiny satellites and the laundry-folding machine
Today on In Case You Missed It: A company called FoldiMate is selling a standalone machine to sit alongside a washing and dryer and fold about 20 garments at a time for $850. Cornell University engineers are sending tiny interstellar computers to the ISS this summer, there they will act as satellites and, eventually, collect information from our nearest neighboring star system, Alpha Centauri. We also round up the week in our TL; DR segment. If you grew up playing The Sims, this piece of news might interest you. We're also very interested in the Visa payment ring the Olympic athletes can wear in Rio. As always, please share any great tech or science videos you find by using the #ICYMI hashtag on Twitter for @mskerryd.
Google and Microsoft want to put Brazil's favelas on the map
To the Brazilian government, favelas, often referred to as "the slums," don't portray an image they're willing to share with the world. So much so, in fact, that during the past World Cup some favela residents were reportedly being forced to leave their homes behind, as Brazil officials were looking to polish areas surrounding the stadiums playing host to the most watched sporting event on the planet. In Rio de Janeiro, favelas make up roughly a quarter of the population, yet somehow they aren't often found city maps, either physical or online. To help with the latter, The Wall Street Journal is reporting that Google and Microsoft have begun mapping Rio's favelas, albeit both companies are doing so in separate initiatives.
Gadget Rewind 2004: Rio Carbon
Before the Rio Carbon arrived to take on Apple's iPod juggernaut in 2004, there was Diamond Multimedia's first stab at the digital music market: the Rio PMP300, a portable music player released in 1998. Since it was one of the first portable MP3 players ever to be sold, Diamond ended up embroiled in a fight for the future of the format. The PMP300's ability to play digital music files downloaded from a computer led to a groundbreaking legal battle with the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). The RIAA challenged the company in court, claiming that its use of digital music files was copyright infringement, but Diamond won out and cleared the way for a new wave of portable music players (PMPs) to hit the market.
Angry Birds Rio getting free Rio 2 movie content updates
To celebrate the impending release of Rio 2, the animated feature about a bunch of tropical birds from Rio de Janeiro migrating to the Amazon rainforest, the free Angry Birds Rio video game tie-in will receive several content updates. Four different episodes, each comprised of numerous levels, will be doled out over the next few months; however, the first of these planned content updates, "Rocket Rumble," is available right now on both Android and iOS. Angry Birds Rio launched in March of 2011 and secured 10 million downloads in under a month. The Angry Birds franchise alone earned creator Rovio $100 million in sales throughout 2011.
Jetman soars over Rio, flies circles around historical landmarks (video)
Why would you want to leap out of a perfectly good aircraft? To fly a winged jetpack over the city of Rio de Janeiro, of course. It sounds nuts, but it's just a day in the life for Yves Rossy, the self proclaimed "Jetman" who flew over the Grand Canyon last year. Since soaring over the Rio Grande, Rossy has pitted his carbon-fiber wings against a rally car on Top Gear, taken to the skies over Abu Dhabi and, most recently, buzzed Brazil's famous Christ the Redeemer statue. Jetman rocketed past the monument on an 11 minute flight earlier this week, beginning his journey by dropping out of a helicopter over Lagoa Rodrigo de Freitas. Rossy pulled his Rocketeer trick and eventually parachuted to safety on Copacabana beach. Sound fun? Head past the break to see the man in action. Us? We'll keep our feet planted on terra firma, thanks.
Duran Duran and Second Life, isn't that bizarre?
According to Tateru Nino at Dwell On It, Duran Duran had promised its presence in the world of Second Life back in 2006. Second Life residents were hungry like a wolf for more information, but the band was lost in a crowd. At long last, the band announced yesterday the launch of Duran Duran Universe, a new zone in Linden Lab's virtual world. Although there may be no dancing on the sand, community manager Crissy Welinder posted the official announcement to the Duran Duran website: "Duran Duran Universe is packed full of wonderful artistic treasures, interactive features, innovative multimedia and exciting events and games." Every part of the Second Life zone has been carefully selected by members of the band, and they hope it is one continuous party. For more information about Duran Duran Universe, don't twist through a dusty land, just visit the band's official website.
Rio tie-in game out tomorrow, sans Angry Birds
THQ announced a Rio movie tie-in game today, and it'll be available ... tomorrow. The minigame collection "inspired" by the upcoming animated movie will be available for all current home consoles and DS. The title will be budget-priced at $29.99 on all platforms. The console versions support up to four players who can compete in over 40 minigames, with "three additional exclusive" games in the Xbox version. The DS version is a rhythm game with 20 levels featuring Latin and hip-hop beats, and also includes four non-rhythm minigames. For a minigame Rio experience that'll cost a lot less, the Angry Birds phenomenon has made a Rio version available on the Mac and iOS App Stores for $5 and $1, respectively, as well as on the Amazon Appstore for Android.
Angry Birds Rio will be exclusive to Amazon Appstore on Android launch
Think you'll be heading to the Android Market to get your next fix of Rovio Mobile's insanely popular Angry Birds? Think again. The next installment in the aviary vengeance saga, Angry Birds Rio, will launch exclusively on Amazon's upcoming Appstore for Android. That does sound like it will eventually achieve universal distribution via the Market, but in the interim Amazon has scored a pretty big scoop in its efforts to attract users to its own app repository. We're also promised the Appstore is launching "very soon" and Amazon has just inaugurated an @amazonappstore account on Twitter to keep us abreast of when precisely that will happen.
Super Bowl 'Rio' commercial reveals secret behind Angry Birds easter egg
Last night's blockbuster football contest might not have featured the most hee-larious advertisements in all of Super Bowl history -- but you can't say they weren't rewarding. Take, for instance, the trailer for 20th Century Fox's Rio, which featured a split-second image of one of the avian protagonists of Angry Birds, as well as the numbers "13-12." A few of the game's more dedicated players have cracked that riddle -- firing off the birds in a specific sequence and direction on said stage unlocks a special, Super Bowl-themed level, provided you've updated to the most recent version of the game. Check out a video after the jump to see how the bird-firing maneuver is properly executed. Also, we'd like to see more video game easter eggs in television commercials, please. Trust us, ad executives, it's good for you too -- we must have watched that freaking Rio commercial like, twenty times now.
Angry Birds ties into Super Bowl ad with secret level hint
During the Super Bowl game last night, you may have seen an ad for a soon-to-be-released animated feature called Rio. Cleverly tied into that advertisement was a way to get access to a secret level in that special app installed on just about every iPhone, iPad, Mac and iPod touch in the universe: Angry Birds. If you happened to be watching closely about 26 seconds into the 32 second ad, you would have seen the infamous red bird, a golden egg and the numbers 13-12 on a wall behind a couple of characters from the movie. According to ex-TUAW blogger and current Mashable writer Christina Warren (Hi, C-Mac!), to uncover a special golden egg, you need to go to level 13-12, shoot a white bird backwards and then drop an egg (I am not making this up). Performing this arcane ritual will reward the patient Angry Birds player with a football-shaped golden egg. Completing the game level gives you the opportunity to enter a contest to attend the Rio premiere. Let's make sure it's an Apple fan (and hopefully a TUAW reader) who is walking the red carpet the night of the premiere. Rovio, the publisher of Angry Birds, will also be delivering a special Rio version of the game when the film is released on March 22, 2011. Check out the ad video on the next page if you think that we may have Photoshopped the image seen at the top of this post.
Super Bowl ad to contain hidden Angry Birds level code
If you're just hanging out playing Angry Birds in the living room while the Super Bowl is on, be sure to look up while the commercial for the animated film Rio is playing. Hidden in the ad will be a code for a downloadable Angry Birds levels (though it's not been specified if it will be compatible with all versions of the game.) Users who find the code in the ad (which will be available on YouTube later), and then complete the level will be entered to win a trip to the March 22 premiere of Rio -- the same day the Angry Birds Rio promotional game is released. No details about the level itself have been released, but we can confirm it involves slingshotted spheroid birds launched at rickety structures.
Angry Birds doing a movie tie-in as well
Hot on the heels of the announcement that Doodle Jump will be working with Universal to promote the upcoming Hop movie, Angry Birds developer Rovio Mobile confirmed it will be producing a new version of Angry Birds set in Rio. This new version will be used to promote the upcoming movie Rio, which is being produced by 20th Century Fox and developed by the folks behind the popular Ice Age series of animated children's movies. The movie will follow the adventures of two blue macaws, Blu and Jewel, who will also star in the new Angry Birds game. The amusing trailer for the game is included after the break and is worth a look for Angry Birds fans. The game will debut in March and will feature 45 new levels with additional levels available via app updates. This move by Rovio is yet another example of Hollywood eyeing the iOS platform for promotion and profits. This trend was kicked off in a big way when Disney acquired Tapulous, the developer of the popular Tap Tap series of games, and this is probably far from the last we'll see of it. You can check out the movie trailer after the jump. [Via touchArcade]
Angry Birds Rio movie tie-in game revealed, coming in March
The next Angry Birds game isn't based on a holiday. It's not a true sequel, either. Instead, it's a licensed game based on 20th Century Fox's upcoming animated film, Rio. This bizarre partnership makes some sense once you find out what the movie is actually about: A group of kidnapped birds join together in an attempt to escape and stop their captors once and for all. But we wonder -- will Angry Birds Rio feature pigs? And will the birds be just as suicidal as before? Rio hits theaters on April 15, but the licensed game will be available on "app stores worldwide" (presumably on both Android and iOS) in March. Check out the teaser trailer after the break.
Kyocera Rio hits Cricket today for $130
Alright, we know what you're thinking, so let's just clear this up at the outset: it ain't Android. That being said, Kyocera's new Rio for regional carrier Cricket features a 2.8-inch QVGA touchscreen, 1.3 megapixel camera, microSD expansion up to 16GB, a 3.5mm headphone jack, stereo Bluetooth, and an optical trackpad -- a rather unusual touch for this market segment. Of course, Cricket likes to play the no-contract game, and sure enough, the $129.99 that the carrier is asking nets you the Rio without a commitment. It's available today; follow the break for the full press release.
