Here’s the trailer for Peter Jackson’s next installment of The Hobbit trilogy! The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug arrives in theatres December 13, 2013.
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The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug
Posted in Soul Brother Presents
Tagged entertainment, film, movie, Peter Jackson, The Hobbit
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Kanye West Talks About His Career and Album ‘Yeezus’
By Jon Caramanica
From Shangri-la Studio here you can see the Pacific Ocean just over the fence lapping calmly at Zuma Beach. And this compound is just as Zen, with recording equipment set up in various locations, including an old bus and a spotless white house with all the mirrors removed.
But there is no rest at Shangri-la, at least for Kanye West. For several days in late May and early June, he and a rotating group of intimates, collaborators and hangers-on were holed up in service of finishing “Yeezus” (Roc-A-Fella/Def Jam), Mr. West’s sixth solo album, out Tuesday, and one that marks a turn away from his reliable maximalism to something more urgent and visceral.
The original studios were built under the supervision of Bob Dylan and the Band in the 1970s — some of “The Last Waltz” was filmed here — and the property was bought in 2011 by the producer Rick Rubin, the man whose brain Mr. West had come here to pick. Together, they sandpapered off the album’s rough edges, rerecording vocals and sometimes writing entire new verses. Even as the deadline loomed, Mr. West made room for an appearance at the baby shower for his girlfriend, Kim Kardashian, who’s expecting their first child. As the days passed, the songs noticeably morphed, becoming more skeletal and ferocious.
One afternoon, Mr. Rubin exited the studio and declared, to everyone and no one, “It’s un-bee-leave-able what’s happening in there.”
Read More Kanye West Talks About His Career and Album ‘Yeezus’ – NYTimes.com.
Posted in News from the Soul Brother
Tagged entertainment, hip-hop, Kanye West, Kim Kardashian, music, Rick Rubin
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300: Rise of an Empire
Coming next March, Zach Snyder and Kurt Johnstad wrote the screenplay and Noam Murro directs the sequel to 300.
Posted in Soul Brother Presents
Tagged 300 (film), Kurt Johnstad, Warner Bros, Zach Snyder, Zack Snyder
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Why Oprah Winfrey’s New Shows Are Working for OWN
By Allison Samuels
Just this week OWN, the cable network founded by talk show icon Oprah Winfrey, announced the renewal of three of its top reality shows: Iyanla: Fix My Life, starring Iyanla Vanzant; Life with La Toya, starring La Toya Jackson; and Raising Whitley, starring Kim Whitley all feature black women at the center. Eric Logan, president of OWN, credited each show with increasing the network’s ratings overall and propelling the once-struggling cable station to the No. 1 viewing choice for African-American women on Saturday nights.
But, oh, what a difference two years can make. When OWN debuted in 2011 a amid much fanfare, the weekly lineup had little in common with its current offerings. Names like Shania Twain, Sarah Ferguson, The Judds, and Rosie O’Donnell were the famous faces being touted as Winfrey and team tried to recapture the mainstream and very diverse audience she’d enjoyed for nearly 20 years on her hugely successful The Oprah Winfrey Show.
Read More Why Oprah Winfrey’s New Shows Are Working for OWN – The Daily Beast.
Dexter Final Season Scoop: Does Dexter Have to Die?
Dexter Morgan (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
By Natalie Abrams
It’s the beginning of the end.
When Dexter kicks off its final season (Sunday, June 30 at 9/8c on Showtime), expect a huge shift in the relationships we’ve come to know and love over the years. Sure, Deb (Jennifer Carpenter) and Dexter (Michael C. Hall) hit a rough patch last year after she discovered her foster brother is a serial killer, but they will hit their rockiest road yet in the wake of LaGuerta’s (Lauren Velez) death.
Season 8 picks up six months after Deb fatally shot her captain in order to protect Dexter, and she’s not handling it very well. But Dexter will have more than his sister’s downward spiral to deal with as the show introduces Dr. Evelyn Vogel (Charlotte Rampling), a psychiatrist who helped Harry (James Remar) create the Code that justifies Dexter’s serial killing. She comes into his life when this season’s big bad — dubbed The Brain Surgeon — sets his sights on her. Pair that with Dexter’s angry ex Hannah McKay (Yvonne Strahovski) returning, and Dexter fans are sure in for one hell of a last hurrah this season. TVGuide.com turned to executive producer Sara Colleton to get the scoop on what’s in store.
Read More Dexter Final Season Scoop: Does Dexter Have to Die? – Today’s News: Our Take | TVGuide.com.
Search for 1st Web page takes detour into NC
By Jeffrey Collins
For the European physicists who created the World Wide Web, preserving its history is as elusive as unlocking the mysteries of how the universe began.
The scientists at the European Organization for Nuclear Research, known by its French acronym CERN, are searching for the first Web page. It was at CERN that Tim Berners-Lee invented the Web in 1990 as an unsanctioned project, using a NeXT computer that Apple co-founder Steve Jobs designed in the late 80s during his 12-year exile from the company.
Dan Noyes oversees CERN’s website and has taken on the project to uncover the world’s first Web page. He says that no matter how much data they sort through, researchers may never make a clear-cut discovery of the original web page because of the nature of how data is shared.
“The concept of the earliest Web page is kind of strange,” Noyes said. “It’s not like a book. A book exists through time. Data gets overwritten and looped around. To some extent, it is futile.”
In April, CERN restored a 1992 copy of the first-ever website that Berners-Lee created to arrange CERN-related information. It was the earliest copy CERN could find at the time, and Noyes promised then to keep looking.
Read More Search for 1st Web page takes detour into NC.
Posted in News from the Soul Brother
Tagged Apple, CERN, NeXT Computer, Steve Jobs, Web page, World Wide Web
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Pope’s General Audience
Posted in Soul Brother Presents
Tagged faitth, Pope Francis, religion, Vatican, Vatican City. Catholic
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Yahoo to free up IDs of dormant email accounts
Yahoo is trying to breathe new life into inactive email accounts by giving away the identifications beginning next month.
The program announced Wednesday will give Web surfers an opportunity to claim a new handle that had previously been unavailable. It also represents a last chance for Yahoo users who haven’t logged in for at least a year to keep the address.
Yahoo plans to release the inactive accounts unless the current owner logs in again before July 15. After that, the identifications will be available to all comers and will be ready to use again in mid-August.
The Sunnyvale, California, company isn’t specifying how many emails are in the dead pool. A Yahoo spokeswoman predicted a substantial number of IDs will be freed up.
Read More USA TODAY: Latest World and US News – USATODAY.com.
Posted in News from the Soul Brother
Tagged California, Google, Marissa Mayer, technology, World Wide Web, Yahoo
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Don’t Want to Be Spied On? Think About Encryption
By Fahmida Y. Rashid
The twin disclosures last week about the National Security Agency’s extensive surveillance program accomplished something that no amount of SecurityWatch posts could ever have accomplished: It got regular Internet users talking about encryption.
Right after the Guardian exposed a NSA program in which Verizon collected and handed over customer call data to the government, the Washington Post revealed details of PRISM, a much larger surveillance program where the NSA was monitoring people’s online activity, such as email history, types of files posted online, and files being transferred, among others.
Suddenly, everyone wants to know how to send encrypted text messages, to surf the Web without anyone being able to trace their online activities, and to store files that couldn’t be accessed by anyone else. It’s nice to have people suddenly thinking about their online security, instead of just going with whatever is easy and simple.
Encryption At Your Finger Tips
Encrypting files with a private key so that only authorized people can see the contents is extra work. As is password-protecting the hard drive so that anyone can’t just turn on your computer and access the files. Sticking to only secured wireless networks means paying for the service, or setting up special software and credentials. But taking that extra step is not paranoia; it’s security sense.
Just hopping on to an open Wireless hotspot, whether it’s your neighbor’s that you are “borrowing” or connecting while at a cafe or airport, is a security risk. Anyone could be looking at what you are doing, logging your activities, and collecting data. I am concerned about criminals. Many people seem to be more concerned about the government.
Posted in News from the Soul Brother
Tagged Cryptography, Encryption, National Security Agency, NSA, PRISM, privacy, security, Verizon, Washington Post
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Supreme Court OKs patenting of human DNA if synthetic
In a first of its kind ruling on human genes, a unanimous U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday decided that synthetically produced genetic material can be patented but naturally occurring DNA extracted from the human body cannot.
The nine justices handed a partial victory to Salt Lake City, Utah-based biotechnology company Myriad Genetics Inc, which holds the patents in question. But the rights group that challenged the patents also found reason to be pleased.The biotechnology industry had warned that an expansive ruling against Myriad could threaten billions of dollars of investment.
The biotechnology industry had warned that an expansive ruling against Myriad could threaten billions of dollars of investment.
The contentious, uniquely 21st century question before the court was whether any human genes can ever be patented – meaning the holders have exclusive rights to their intellectual property for a defined period.
The court, in an opinion written by Justice Clarence Thomas, ruled that a synthetically produced genetic material made by scientists, known as cDNA, can be patented but that genes extracted from the human body, known as isolated DNA, do not merit the same legal protections.
Read More Supreme Court OKs patenting of human DNA if synthetic | Reuters.
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