Trailers I Just Can't Get Enough Of!

I love movies!

I am always open and proud about that! And it has been a long time since my last movie post! Whoa! So I just decided to just drop by here to post few of my favorite trailers for the past few days. Here they are.

Surrogates. People are living their lives remotely from the safety of their own homes via robotic surrogates -- sexy, physically perfect mechanical representations of themselves. It's an ideal world where crime, pain, fear and consequences don't exist. When the first murder in years jolts this utopia, FBI agent Greer (Willis) discovers a vast conspiracy behind the surrogate phenomenon and must abandon his own surrogate, risking his life to unravel the mystery.



Zombieland. In the horror comedy Zombieland focuses on two men who have found a way to survive a world overrun by zombies. Columbus is a big wuss -- but when you're afraid of being eaten by zombies, fear can keep you alive. Tallahassee is an AK-toting, zombie-slaying' bad ass whose single determination is to get the last Twinkie on earth. As they join forces with Wichita and Little Rock, who have also found unique ways to survive the zombie mayhem, they will have to determine which is worse: relying on each other or succumbing to the zombies.



The Last Airbender. The story follows the adventures of Aang, a young successor to a long line of Avatars, who must put his childhood ways aside and stop the Fire Nation from enslaving the Water, Earth and Air nations.



Avatar. In the future, Jake, a paraplegic war veteran, is brought to another planet, Pandora, which is inhabited by the Na'vi, a humanoid race with their own language and culture. Those from Earth find themselves at odds with each other and the local culture.



It's amazing how technology has evolved, right!

Samuel Morse, telegraph system and Morse Code

Samuel Morse is much known as the American creator of the first telegraph system and notably, the Morse Code. And he was born this day, last 1791.

As a tribute, I decided to make a post to the person, who made communication with long distance possible.

According to Wikipedia.org,

Samuel F.B. Morse was born on April 27, 1791 in Charlestown, Massachusetts, the first child of geographer and Pastor Jedidiah Morse (1761-1826) and Elizabeth Ann Finley Breese (1766-1828). Jedidiah was a great preacher of the Calvinist faith and supporter of the American Federalist party. He not only saw it as a great preserver of Puritan traditions (strict observance of the Sabbath), but believed in its idea of an alliance with Britain in regards to a strong central government. Jedidiah strongly believed in education within a Federalist framework alongside the instillation of Calvinist virtues, morals and prayers for his son. After attending Phillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts, Samuel Morse went on to Yale College to receive instruction in the subjects of religious philosophy, mathematics and science of horses. While at Yale, he attended lectures on electricity from Benjamin Silliman and Jeremiah Day. He earned money by painting. In 1810, he graduated from Yale with Phi Beta Kappa honors.

In addition to this, after his education, he became a painter who created little known masterpieces. Though he isn't know for painting, his invention of the Morse code is one of the reasons and the foundation of why we have technology like telephones and cellphones. Read about the overview of the brief history of how he came up with Morse code at Wikipedia.Org

You rock Samuel Morse!

Try and decode this: - .... . & .... ..- -- .- -. & ... .. -.. . & --- ..-. & - . -.-. .... -. --- .-.. --- --. -.--

Yadda!

Movie Bosses is Listening to Your Tweets

I was actually doing my daily news reading when I found this article at IMDB.com as reported by Studio Briefing. Just wanted to share this great, yet disturbing, kinda funny news about movie bosses listening to your tweets.

In a clear reminder that all that Twitters isn't told to just a small circle of friends, a woman who had been tweeting about trying to download a copy of Adventureland from a BitTorrent site found a message from the movie's distributor, Miramax: "Cmon Amanda, don't do it. #adventureland # fbi." The message took the form of a thumb-typing instant-message writer, lacking case and punctuation, and appeared to be a warning that the FBI might take action against Amanda if she actually found a copy of Adventureland to download. She did not. She did, however, respond to the Miramax tweet. "Okay I won't, Just For You." This time Miramax responded by offering her a free ticket to see the movie. "I was pretty surprised about it," Amanda told the TorrentFreak website. "I couldn't find a working Adventureland torrent anyway."

Just wondering what'll they say if I tweet... nah never mind.

Flutter: The New Twitter

Twitter too wordy for you. After all, 140 characters is indeed too long to read, sometimes, that is.

Enter Flutter, the world's first nanoblogging site.

Zak Ryman, Flutter CEO, says: "I think a lot of people don't have time to Twitter. It just takes too long to compose a message with 140 characters, and then you start getting bombarded by a few tweets and it's like hundreds of characters that you have to read."

Flutter brings the limit down to just 26 characters for Twitaholics, who need more time.

"We limit our users' posts - or flaps, is what we like to call them, because it's like a hummingbird's wings flapping, which is like really fast, which is like, you know, faster than a regular bird tweets - we limit it to 26 characters."

I was literally browsing the internet in random when I saw this video. I say lol to this! Especially with the glasses.

Note: this is of course a joke made from the guys at Slate Video. Kudos for them!

Aniston Dumps Mayer because of Twitter!

Whoa!

Recent Hollywood news says that the break-up between John Mayer and Jennifer Aniston was because of his addiction to Twitter!

A friend of Jen has told Star Magazine that

John suddenly stopped calling her or returning her emails and when she would finally catch up with him, he’d say: ‘I’ve been so busy with work. I’m sorry I haven’t had time to call you back’. Jen was fuming. There he was, telling her he didn’t have time for her and yet his page was filled with Twitter updates.

Every few hours, sometimes minutes, he’d update with some stupid line. And in her mind, she was like ‘He has time for all this Twittering, but he can’t send me a text, an email, make a call?’ He didn’t even deny it. He knew he was avoiding her. So when she called him on it and ended things, he just said OK, and that he was sorry it didn’t work out. He took the break-up like a man.

Whoa! I'm not against Twitter or Jen, but isn't this a lousy reason to end a "long" relationship? Well, welcome to Hollywood! Or to the Internet.
For those who are not familiar with what Twitter is, according to Wikipedia.org:

Twitter is a social networking and micro-blogging service that enables its users to send and read other users' updates known as tweets. Tweets are text-based posts of up to 140 bytes in length. Updates are displayed on the user's profile page and delivered to other users who have signed up to receive them. Senders can restrict delivery to those in their circle of friends (delivery to everyone being the default). Users can send and receive updates via the Twitter website, SMS, RSS (receive only), or through applications such as Tweetie, Twitterrific, Twitterfon, TweetDeck and Feedalizr. The service is free to use over the web, but using SMS may incur phone services provider fees.

Technology has always its human side. It will work against you once you learn not to use it properly. This news for me is absurd because Mayer's addiction only give Twitter a bad impression when its aim is suppose to be the complete opposite.

In case you'll ask, I do have a Twitter account, but been a little busy these past few months that I never got to update it. Well, have a happy tweet!

New Year, New Technological Expectations

Happy New Year, everyone. At last, the turmoil 2008 brought to the world has ended and this time, 2009 kicks in. This year might bring better economic stance or the other way around, but one thing you can never leave behind are the expectations for this year.

The year 2009 surely promises change. Sounds familiar with a speech of a US presidential candidate, ey, but this is what many expect. I expect changes, too. And to focus on the theme of our blog, I decided to post my expectations from 2009 with regard to technological innovations and everything else under the sun. Here goes the few.

• Microsoft Advancement. Lets face it, Vista's great interface and design did not cover up for the errors, bugs and incompatibilities it brought. But this year promises great hope for Microsoft. The new OS they're developing, known as Windows 7 for the moment, has great potential. I have read online, and few of my friends that has tried the beta version actually liked it. (I haven't had the chance to try it) It may bring hope and shed new light for the falling giant.

• Blu-ray Affordability. Let's face it. It gives a new definition to our movie experience at home. As far as I know, no major problems has occurred.(Speaking of problems, I was shocked by the leap year bug of Microsoft Zune! Nah, goodluck Microsoft.) One major problem of Blu-ray players is, well, they eat too much of your budget. Well, ehem...

• Smarter Technology Movies. Being a big fan of movies, I cannot help it but wish more for the movie industry.This year had Wall-e and Iron Man, but other than those, nothing was set on stone.

• Internet Availability. Yes, internet has been more accessible last year compared from other previous year, but I want more. It would really be great if the World Wide Web goes cheaper so that many more will enjoy its wonders. I hope stronger connection between different culture.(Shocking as it is, many countries does not have access to the internet.)

I still have many hopes for the new year. But while we enjoy the innovations this year, lets not forget what good things the previous year have given to us.

Thanks to the readers of this blog. Though there aren't that much of you and you get here so random, I owe you everything. This week, this blog gained a PageRank of 2, and it couldn't have happened without you. Thanks to YOU, thanks 2008 and welcome 2009! :)

Translate Dot Google Dot Com

Language has always been a barrier in all of us. From the start of the time until the modern age, we are4 still divide by how we speak. But since the technological innovations are being created every minute and communication has become more accessible, we can never deny serious efforts and inventions to erase the gap between all of humanity around the world.

And honestly, I can't help it but laugh at the desperate efforts of the few. Don't misunderstand me, this post is not meant to insult the innovations made by Google, but rather, it is to praise them for this great achievement. It is a great effort of bridging all of us. But you also cannot deny that, damn!, they make me laugh.

Yup, I am talking about Translate.Google.Com!
If you have time, go ahead and try it. And just for curiosity, educational and testing (or any other kinds of) purposes, I decided to try it to the universal sentence we all love to type in our grade school. Check it out.

English:
The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog near the bank of the river.

Español:
El rápido zorro marrón saltó sobre el perro perezoso cerca de la orilla del río.

Français:
Le renard brun rapide sauté par dessus le chien paresseux près de la rive de la rivière.

Filipino:
Ang mabilis na brown soro kumuha ng higit sa mga tamad na aso malapit sa bangko ng ilog.

日本語:
クイックブラウンフォックスは、川の銀行の近くの怠惰な犬を飛び越えた。

中國:
有緣千里來相會附近的河岸。

Deutsch
Der flinke rote Fuchs sprang über den faulen Hund in der Nähe der Ufer des Flusses.

العربية:
الثعلب البني السريع قفز فوق الكلب الكسول بالقرب من ضفة النهر.

Italiano:
La volpe veloce marrone saltato oltre il cane pigro vicino alla riva del fiume.

I am not saying anything like I understand all these languages, but I'm quite sure it contains a lot of errors. lol!

But as I have stated before, I admire this effort of Google to bring everyone on the world closer. A little more time, this would be perfect.

Learning Robotics Technologies: What, How and Where?

Have the fascination with robots? Want to learn robotics? Well, what are you waiting for, enroll Bachelor of Science in Robot Technology! But wait, do you think your compassion would be enough for you to take this course? Well, think again.
Course: Bachelor of Science in Robot Technology

This degree aims to teach and train students to become professional robot engineer. Their course syllabus would include variety of works with Mathematics and Engineering fields. Their programs would teach and familiarize with computer programming and the key operations of the robots. There are also choices of emphasis on Technology Management if the students wish.

Requirements: Ofcourse to be able to qualify for this course, you would need to be knowledgeable and must have skills with mechanical and electrical algorithms and rules. Well, they actually encourage that you finish a degree first with these fields. They also require that you must posses skills in the following:

• Basic Electrical Engineering
• Applied Electrical Math
• DC and AC Machines
• Programmable Logic Controllers
• Quantitative Mathematical Reasoning

Skills that will be learned with this would include the ability to understand both the physical and the conceptual functions of robots, to be able to formulate and create working machines.

Well, sounds promising. Now, where should I go if I qualify? There are many schools all over the world that caters and offers robot technology and other related courses. But recently, USNews.com has release their top preferred schools for robotics. I prefer Purdue University.

Purdue University. Their freshmen retention rate is at 86%! Got in for the first year? Well, good luck. This university has earned many acclaims (click on the link to see).

In March 2008, Purdue's speech-language pathology graduate program was ranked second and the audiology program was ranked ninth by U.S. News & World & Report magazine. In engineering, Purdue's aerospace/aeronautical/astronautical program was ranked fifth and the civil and mechanical engineering programs were ranked seventh.

Purdue's Krannert School of Management had two programs ranked in the top 10. Productions/operations was ranked third and supply chain/logistics was ranked eighth.

Purdue's School of Pharmacy was ranked ninth.

Graduate program rankings reflect both masters and doctoral programs or only doctoral programs.

Still thinking this is the right direction for you? Go ahead. Enroll. :)

My Top Five Robot Movies

These days where one can make wonders on the big screen with realistic special effects, it seems easier to make sci-fi movies and robot films. My topic today, my top five favorite robot movies. But I sure want to make some twists and I wanted it to be more related to our theme. So yeah, I chose my top five robot movies wherein the robots developed humanity. Here it goes.

5. Wall-E
What if mankind had to leave Earth, and somebody forgot to turn the last robot off? After hundreds of lonely years of doing what he was built for, Wall-E, short for Waste Allocation Load Lifter Earth-Class, discovers a new purpose in life, besides collecting knick-knacks, when he meets a sleek search robot named Eve. Eve comes to realize that Wall-E has inadvertently stumbled upon the key to the planet's future, and races back to space to report her findings to the humans, who have been eagerly awaiting word that it is safe to return home. Meanwhile, Wall-E chases Eve across the galaxy and sets an adventure into motion.

4. A.I. (Artificial Intelligence)
In the not-so-far future the polar ice caps have melted and the resulting raise of the ocean waters has drowned all the coastal cities of the world. Withdrawn to the interior of the continents, the human race keeps advancing, reaching to the point of creating realistic robots (called mechas) to serve him. One of the mecha-producing companies builds David, an artificial kid which is the first to have real feelings, especially a never-ending love for his "mother", Monica. Monica is the woman who adopted him as a substitute for her real son, who remains in cryo-stasis, stricken by an incurable disease. David is living happily with Monica and her husband, but when their real son returns home after a cure is discovered, his life changes dramatically. A futuristic adaptation of the tale of Pinocchio, with David being the "fake" boy who desperately wants to become "real". (by Chris Makrozahopoulos: makzax@hotmail.com)

3. Robocop Series
After Omni Consumer Products (OCP) announced that it bought out the Detroit police department, the department decides to go on strike. Alex Murphy, gets transferred from Metro South to the West. He and his partner, Anne Lewis, track down a group of criminals led by Clarence Boddicker. Unfortunately, Murphy was killed by Clarence's gang. Bob Morton, one of OCP's employees, transforms Murphy's corpse into Robocop, to compete with another employee Dick Jones' ED-209. Robocop's tests are successful. Unfortunately, Robocop rediscovers his memories (when he was Alex Murphy), and now knows he has to find and arrest Clarence Boddicker. He realizes that Clarence is working for Bob Morton's competition Dick Jones. Now, Robocop must stop both Clarence and Dick Jones. (by John Wiggins)

2. Blade Runner
In 2019, humans have genetically engineered Replicants, which are essentially humans who are designed for labor and entertainment purposes. They are illegal on earth, and if they make it to our planet they are to be hunted down and killed. Rick Deckard is a blade runner, or a hunter of replicants. A group of replicants make it to Los Angeles to seek out a way to extend their life span. Replicants have a built in 4 year life span, and this group is at the end. Although he hunts them to the end, the replicants end up teaching the detached Deckard what it really means to be human.

1. The Terminator Series
In the future, Skynet, a computer system fights a losing war against the humans who built it and who it nearly exterminated. Just before being destroyed, Skynet sends a Terminator back in time to kill Sarah, the mother to be of John Connor, the Leader of the human resistance. The terminator can pass for human, is nearly indestructible, and has only one mission, killing Sarah Connor. One soldier is sent back to protect her from the killing machine. He must find Sarah before the Terminator can carry out it's mission. (by John Vogel:jlvogel@comcast.net)

There you have it. Well, can robots really develop feelings? Can they become humans? We can never tell.

Hikikomori - Caused by Technology?

The rapid change of technology these days is the main reason why our age has been dubbed as the age of the Rise of Innovations. True. Technological innovations are being created every day, if not every second. Thus, also creating stir that we, the people using and creating them, need to cope with the changes that these bring.

Good thing if we can adapt to these changes. What if we can't?

Since all men feel pressure from the world and from other people, some people react by completely separating themselves. Hikikomori is term that Japanese use referring to the sociological phenomenon wherein some people choose to "withdraw" themselves from other people. In other words, they preferred to confine from their social lives, living in complete isolation. This is done by not talking to other people or even trying to interact with others, which ends up that they have very few friends, if none at all. In most cases, like that in Japan, youth would tend to lock up themselves in their room for a long period of time, sometimes taking years. There are many factors that may cause this, whether it would be a personal reason or a social one.
One of which reason that could trigger Hikikomori is the disability to cope with the changes in technology. Most youth, due to monetary limitations, tend to separate from others thinking that it is better since they are unable to use the current fad, like new cellphones or digital cameras. Their envy results to this decision, thinking that their incaspacity to cope will make their interaction with others very difficult.

Another reason may also be the complete opposite of the first. Some would tend to seclude themselves as they are very busy with the latest technology that they got in hand. For example, instead of going outside to socialize, young people would often prefer to stay inside their rooms and try out the newly released video game.

See how technology sometimes become a problem.

This can, however, be fixed with interaction with others and a little guidance and discipline from their family. Or if this is not enough, try reaching out with a good psychological advise. But most of all, try putting a little touch of humanity when we use technology. By then we can fully utilize and share the main objective of technology. Connection.

Japan's Age of Machines

Japan is the country in which most of us knows that have great expertise in creating innovations, specifically robots and machines.

I chose to make a time line of few of Japan's greatest achievements. Here is my compilation:

1945. The United States dropped the uranium A-bomb "Little Boy" on Hiroshima on August 6 and Nagasaki is devastated by the plutonium A-bomb "Fat Man" on August 9, leaving Japan to surrender on the war and to start all over from scratch.

1950. Tokyo Telecommunications Engineering Corp. (or Sony later) develops the G-type, Japan's first magnetic tape recorder.

1952. The debut of Astro Boy, a hero by manga guru Osama Tezuka. He is considered as more than just a fictional character but has become a cultural icon for the country.

1953. NHK begins TV broadcasting!

1955. Sony releases the TR-55, Japan's first pocket sized transistor radio after buying the license for transistor.

1957. Casio releases Casio 14-A, the world's first compact electronic calculator.

1960. Sony comes out with the world's first all transistor television set.

1964. First scheduled service of the Tokaido Shinkansen (bullet train) began.

1966. Middle-class consumers aims to get the "Three Cs" - a car, a color television and an air-condition.

1969. Kawasaki Heavy Industries begins manufacturing Japan's first industrial robot, Unimate 2000, primarily used to weld automotive parts together.

1970. Fujiko Fujio's comic strip about Doraemon, a robot cat from the future, debuts.

1973. NTT started offering fax services in all of Japan.

1976. JVC launches VHS-format video recorder.

1979. Sony releases its portable Walkman.

1981. Fujitsu Fanuc begins using robots to manufacture robot parts.

1982. Compact Discs and CD players go on sale, developed simultaneously by Sony and Philips.

1983. Nintendo releases Family Computer, also known as the Nintendo Entertainment System, bringing videogames to the living room.

1989. Nintendo comes out with portable Game Boy.

1994. Sony releases PlayStation game system.

1996. Nintendo 64, first 64-bit game system, goes to the market; DVD player released by Toshiba and Matsushita simultaneosly.

1997. Honda develops P3, a humaniod robot.

1999. Sony releases the Aibo robot dog.

2000. SoftBank cheif Masayoshi Son surpasses Microsoft's Bill Gates in paper wealth briefly.

These is just a brief summary and I may have left out some details. But if you wanted to add something, just leave out a comment. Thanks!

Sources: Time Magazine, May 2000 issue and Wikipedia.org

Pleo: The World's Smartest Pet Robot

Everyone of us would sometimes long to be a child again. Someone who is carefree. Someone who appreciate life's simple joys. Someone who wants to have fun. Someone who plays TOYS. lol, I don't know with you but I would want to play robot toys again, just like when I was young.

Toys have evolve very much like with the pace of technology. As time passes by, and as technology progresses, there is also a rapid development of toys. From the traditional stuff toys, to hand held game consoles and now, interactive robots. Wouldn't you wish these existed in the 90s?

Back in 2006, Ugobe unveiled the yet smartest toy of the generation, Pleo.



Pleo is a robotic toy designed to emulate the appearance and act with the behavior of a week old Camarasaurus, a cute green dinosaur. A Camarasaurus may grow up to 60 feet long when it reaches adulthood, but its just as size as this toy when it was newborn. It was designed by Caleb Chung.

What makes Pleo special is that every individual toy is designed to be different. As the Official Site of Pleo has stated "Every Pleo is autonomous. Yes, each one begins life as a newly-hatched baby Camarasaurus, but that's where predictability ends and individuality begins. Like any creature, Pleo feels hunger and fatigue - offset by powerful urges to explore and be nurtured. He'll graze, nap and toddle about on his own -when he feels like it! Pleo dinosaur can change his mind and his mood, just as you do."

Isn't it great! Your Pleo can have a very unique personality, depending on how you raise it.

What also makes this toy very different and outstanding is that it can convey different expressions and emotions. It can go happy, playful, scared or sad, depending on the awareness it has developed with its companionship with you! Pleo also grows old with you. He starts as a newly hatch, then you can take care of him as an infant until he turns juvenile. And his characteristics would all depend on his experiences as he is growing old, would he be shy or confident or joyful.

So it would be wiser to treat Pleo as special as you could. This toy is also capable to interaction with others, or be it another Pleo. You can go and hug it, cuddle with it, talk to it, listen, shake hands and many more! Plus, Pleos can go bond with each other.

Ugobe has used its Life OS in developing this innovation. Life OS is the complex platform of tools and technologies that enable Pleo's mechanical, electronic, sensory, and Artificial Intelligence systems to interact as a lifelike whole. A Pleo is equipped with a infrared transmitter and receiver, touch sensors all over its body, cameras, microphones and speakers. It is also mobilized with a rechargeable battery, making it very mobile.(Plus, you'll know when you need to charge it because Pleo goes tired!)

Indeed, this is a great step in developing interactive robots and innovative entertainment. Go Pleo!