StateOfTheUnion
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After Math: The state of the 'uniom'
It was a week of taking stock as the President meandered his way through the State of the Union address and a number of tech firms reviewed their Q4 earnings. Alphabet and Amazon both had something to crow about, while Apple and GoPro both posted less than stellar holiday sales. Numbers, because how else would we realized that, at this point, the rules are made up and the points don't matter?
What Trump means when he talks nukes at the State of the Union
President Donald Trump is expected to cover five main topics in his first State of the Union address tonight, including the economy, immigration, infrastructure and trade. The fifth topic, national security, will put the spotlight on North Korea and the erratic, ad hominem nuclear standoff between North Korean leader Kim Jong-un and Trump himself. The tension of this relationship has spilled over to Twitter, where Trump has lobbed insults and threats at Kim over the past year. Trump called Kim "little Rocket Man" and declared the US' "nuclear button" was "much bigger and more powerful" than Kim's. In August, Trump promised "fire and fury" if North Korea didn't stop testing nuclear weapons, and Kim later called Trump a "mentally deranged dotard." Meanwhile, North Korea carried out more than a dozen nuclear tests throughout 2017, including launching intercontinental ballistic missiles theoretically capable of striking the US mainland. Its most recent ICBM test was in November.
Go behind the scenes of the State of the Union with Snapchat
The White House announced today that it had joined Snapchat ahead of tomorrow's State of the Union address, the last before President Obama leaves office. Snapchat is a social site where users' fleeting posts disappear after just a few seconds. It boasts over 100 million active users, most of which weren't even old enough to vote when he was elected -- that is, they're under 25. Users can follow the president's posts by adding WhiteHouse or scanning the snapcode below.
Amazon will stream the President's State of the Union speech
The President's State of the Union address has been viewable online for years, but you've had to visit either the White House's website or YouTube. That's not very convenient in an era when streaming services reach just about every device you know. And the government knows it, apparently: the Office of Digital Strategy has announced that President Obama's final State of the Union speech will stream on Amazon Instant Video (both live and on-demand) in addition to the usual sources. The goal is to bring video to where people watch, rather than make you hunt it down. If you want to tune on your Fire TV, you can.
White House releases State of The Union address online ahead of time
As is customary, tonight the President will give his State of the Union address but in a first-time move, the entire speech is available for anyone to read online. It's usually released to reporters early under embargo, but this is the age of the internet and the White House posted it for everyone to read just a few minutes ago. Even if you're watching from home (on network TV, news channels or YouTube), you can know what's coming next. Whatever your political leanings, this seems like a pretty good way to expand access beyond just those with the right connections. [Image credit: Jim Lo Scalzo-Pool/Getty Images]
President Obama uses Facebook and Vine to preview his free college plan
President Barack Obama is previewing parts of his State of the Union address in a bid to drum up support ahead of the big speech, and his latest effort is breaking some ground -- both in the policy and how he's presenting it. The head of state took to Facebook, Twitter and Vine to unveil a proposal that would give Americans two free years of community college so long as they maintain good grades and graduate. It's a rare move for discussing politics online. While the president regularly makes announcements on social networks, it's not often that you get a peek at the State of the Union while you're catching up on friends' status updates and looping cat videos.
President Obama recognizes Apple during State of the Union address
During tonight's State of the Union address, US President Barack Obama gave a specific shout out to Apple, and indirectly to CEO Tim Cook, who is attending the speech. The President cited Apple's plans to bring production of one of its Mac product lines back to the U.S. Cook was previously announced as one of Michelle Obama's guests for the State of the Union address. Follow this link to see the spot in the speech where Obama recognizes Apple. It's also embedded below at the 24:10 mark.
Bing Pulse launching with help from Fox News, aims to make State of the Union speech more interactive
Just in time for next week's State of the Union address, Bing announced it's teamed up with Fox News to launch Bing Pulse, a one-stop hub where folks can easily interact and share their thoughts with one another while President Barack Obama's speech is taking place. The Microsoft-owned search engine says that Pulse will allow participants to vote on reactions to the event every five seconds, with the impending results being shown on the Bing Politics site. What's more, Bing believes "this will be the largest live online poll in history," which will be enhanced by the outfit's new Beat "social sentiment tracker" -- a service that's set to collect and analyze data from Twitter in order to figure out what are the trendiest political topics during the speech. Folks interested in joining the Bing Pulse conversation should hit that more coverage link to get acquainted -- and, of course, don't forget to bookmark it so you're all set come February 12th.
Bridgelux silicon LED could mean bright future for solid state lighting
While Democrats and Republicans squabble over the future of the incandescent light bulb, a Livermore-based company has produced an LED that they claim could lead to brighter, more affordable solid state lighting. By growing gallium nitride on low-cost silicon wafers, as opposed to the typical sapphire and silicon carbide substrates, the company has achieved an output of 135lm/W (lumens per watt) with a color correlated temperature of 4730K-- brighter than any affordable LED lighting solution we've ever seen. Of course, this isn't the first time efficacy of this level has been achieved, and we've yet to see a practical application, but if Bridgelux's numbers are right, this could mean a 75 percent cut in LED production costs. The company expects the technology to make its way to real world lights in the next two to three years -- perhaps by then the furor over pigtail light bulbs will have settled a bit. Enlightening PR after the break.
Inhabitat's Week in Green: the power plant you can ski, and NASA's orbiting Nanosail-D
Each week our friends at Inhabitat recap the week's most interesting green developments and clean tech news for us -- it's the Week in Green. This week we saw new horizons dawn for green transportation as NASA's Nanosail-D became the first solar sail spacecraft to orbit the earth and President Obama issued a call for one million electric vehicles in his State of the Union Address. We also test drove the recently released electric Mini Cooper and took a look at several transportation breakthroughs that could clean up car emissions - researchers have developed an air pollution-fighting road treatment and Cella Energy claims to have created an emission free gas that costs $1.50 per gallon. In other news, this week Qatar showcased designs for 9 sustainable stadiums for the 2022 World Cup and BIG unveiled plans for a plant-wrapped waste to power plant that doubles as a ski slope. Super cities are on the rise in Asia as China announced plans to construct a mega-city the size of Switzerland and SOM unveiled a masterplan for a cutting-edge green tech city for Hanoi. On the other hand, Dubai's architecture of excess is fading fast as a report revealed that the emirate's world-shaped archipelago of islands is sinking into the sea. We also showcased the latest in portable tech as we brought you a brilliant Fire Department iPhone app that stands to save lives, and we rounded up our five favorite phone-charging green gadgets. And if you're looking for a case to carry it all in, check out these chic quilted iPad bags - just the thing to keep your kit cozy and protected during this month's blizzards.
The State of the Xbox 360 Fanboy Union
Last week US President Bush had his State of the Union, this week us fanboys get ours. Chris over at eToychest posted the official State of the Xbox 360 Fanboy Union which recaps the highs and lows of 2006 as well as where we are headed in 2007. This year we have some hurdles to jump, heavy competition to face, and fanboys to deal with. But most importantly we have a community, a strong community that will make the 360 even more successful in 2007. It's your duty as an Xbox 360 fanboy to read the State of the Union address and be resilient against the challenges that are ahead. Madam speaker ...[Thanks, Chuck]
George W. in high-def next week
If you had plans to watch any network television next Tuesday at 9 p.m., you might want to record something now. Of course, the State of the Union address is a key time for the President to communicate directly to the public. Like last year, the big speech will be in high-def and even in Surround Sound for you political audiophiles. You gotta love hearing comments under Democrats people's breath thanks to Surround Sound.At the moment, only ABC is indicating that the prez will be in HD with their 720p feed, but other networks could follow. Aside from the importance of good speech-writing, we're wondering if the Presidential make-up aide is doing anything different due to the details of HD.
