Paramount to release thousands of film clips on Facebook

Paramount Pictures will become the first major studio to make thousands of movie clips available for use on the internet, launching its VooZoo application Monday on Facebook. DVDs of the movies will be offered for sale through a button that appears after each clip is played. Eventually, the studio will be using the same method to market upcoming films. VooZoo is expected to attract a few hundred thousand users within its first two months. The task of selecting clips was time consuming. Paramount staffers worked for more than a year to archive and tag the clips being offered. Paramount officials say they're not sure how much they may reap through the experiment, and have no "revenue goals" attached to the project. I think that this new gadget on Facebook will atract lots of people and will make great publicity and it's going to be really cool to have this on Facebook.

Ban Bully video game, activists say

This article is about Young anti-bullying activists have asked the federal and provincial governments to ban a video game linked to bullying. Katie Neu and Robert Frenette, who founded BullyingCanada.ca, wrote to the political leaders on Tuesday, the same day that Bully: Scholarship Edition was released. They wrote the letters "on behalf of all the victims of bullying," said Neu. Based on their research, the students believe that violent video games promote bullying at school, she said. The game, an updated version of Bully released in 2006, features a 15-year-old student at a boarding school who has to make his way in a new environment, where there are cliques and bullies jump students in the halls. "This is an angst-filled game, a light-hearted simulation of the horrors of high school ... there's no blood, no guns, no boosting of cars," Hilary Goldstein wrote in a review of the game on IGN.com in February. The player has to deal with the the groups at school, by diplomacy or fighting, and can even win kisses, from girls or boys, Goldstein wrote. I think that it's good that they made a game to say that bullying is around the world and we got to stop it as soon as possible.

Do You See What I See? Translating Images out of Brain Waves

This article is about scientists from the University of California, Berkeley, report in Nature today that they have developed a method capable of decoding the patterns in visual areas of the brain to determine what someone has seen. Needless to say, the potential implications for society are sweeping. The scientists say that previous attempts to extract "mental content from brain activity" only allowed them to decode a finite number of patterns. Researchers would feed image to an individual (or ask them to think about an object) one at a time and then look for a corresponding brain activity pattern. "You would need to know [beforehand], for each thought you want to read out, what kind of pattern of activity goes with it," says John-Dylan Haynes, a professor at the Bernstein Center for Computational Neuroscience Berlin and the Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences that was not affiliated with the new work. Researchers used functional magnetic resonance images (fMRIs) to record activity in the visual cortices of a pair of volunteers (two of the study's co-authors) while they viewed a series of images. They examined the brain by dividing the regions into voxels (volumetric units, or 3-D pixels) and noting the part of the picture to which each section responded. For instance, one voxel, or slice, might respond in a certain pattern to, say, colors in the upper left-hand corner of the photo, whereas another voxel would be set off by something in a different portion of the picture.

The computer that decides if we live or die

Can the computer really decide if we live or die? This article is about this guy named Wendler who hopes to build up a broader data bank of personal profiles, which will include age, gender, religious and ethnic background, to advance the software. He is confident that will enable more accurate patient predictions. New software should soon be able to predict more accurately than loved ones how comatose patients would choose to be treated, if they were able to make the decision themselves. The study compared how accurately their computer-based tool predicted a patient's preferred treatments compared with what loved ones said. Results showed both methods got it right around two-thirds to three-quarters of the time. I think that it could help people but is it going to be more accurate than what we already have?

Your thoughts can now be real images????

This article is informing about a new (and a little scary) method capable of decoding the patterns in visual areas of the brain to determine what someone has seen, meaning that this method and new technology can translate what the brain is thinking, (while dreaming, reading a book, etc) into images.
"This general visual decoder would have great scientific and practical use," the researchers say. "We could use the decoder to investigate differences in perception across people, to study covert mental processes such as attention, and perhaps even to access the visual content of purely mental phenomena such as dreams and imagery."
This is a huge step for technology, because for years scientists had been trying to make something like this, and the only thing that they got when they tried, was decoding numbers and patterns, but nothing specific!

How did they get from not having nothing, to getting images from the brain?
After a long time of trying, scientists started working with a new method, they asked a person to think about an specific object, and later a specific situation, while they thaught of that, they decoded patterns and numbers, after a long time of doing this, they started understanding and getting more related to the human brain, and after alot of studying, they got it.

But still, people should not get confused! This is an algorithm that can indentify images by translating brain activity, it is still huge for technology, but not as people think, it is not like a movie of peoples thaughts, it can only show some images,and it is still a far way from reading minds!

my opinion
I think this articule is awesome, I thaught it was very interesting, I did not know that such a thing that could actually put what someone is thinking in pictures could exist, I think that the people invented this, should continue studying about it and maybe invent something more, discover something new about the human brain, or maybe even discover a medicine or something related to the brain that has not been discovered! I really think this was an excellent idea, but I also think, they should do more experiments in this because it really is a new thing, and maybe it causes some problems that people are not aware of right now, I think they should test it before trying it with alot of persons and putting them in some kind of risk! If there is a problem with it, I think they should fix it, but still continue with this project because it is really cool and alot of good thinks could come out of it!! I thought this was a really interesting article!!I had never heard of something like this, and it impressed me, i think it is really cool!!!
**Maria Rubio

Paramount to release thousands of film clips on Facebook

this article is about putting paramount pictures onto face book.
it says that the paramount pictures will become the first major studio to make thousands of movie clips.
"The short clips for a movie that you've already seen before helps you relive the moment," as derek broes said, Paramount's senior vice-president of entertainment.
users on facebook will have access to footage from thousands of movies,including forrest gump and the ten commandments.Facebook users can send the video clips to others users on the site.
the clips last from a few sends to a few minutes.covering everything from Audrey Hepburn's monologue about her "no-name slob" of a cat in Breakfast at Tiffany's, to Eddie Murphy's signature chuckle from Beverly Hills Cop.
they say that dvds of the movies will be offered by pressing a button on the screen.
VooZoo is expected to attract a few hundred thousand users within its first two months.

i think that this is not really good,because i saw a comment on the page of he article that said i xant find it is it only in USA?..and i thought that wasnt really nice because if they post an article like this im sure everyone wans to check it out anywhere they are but if its only in the united states than thats not really nice. the other reason i dont like it is because it sounds like theyre selling movies that havent been out yet and isnt that stealing?

Grand Canyon Flooded to save one fish !

First of all before I say anything...O MY GOD I hadn't even read the article and I was jumping off the walls in rage of this foolish act. The humpback chub, it is being treated like a seismograph in the ring of fire, it needs unbelievable attention. I do not really like this fish and wouldn't keep it as a pet but the only reason I can understand this action is because of the all mighty food chain. Thankfully they had some sense and did not flood all of it and only a section... but still flooding such a mass amount of land is crazy to me. The whole grand canyon attracts enough visitors to produce enough money to build a machine that brings animals back from their fossils (not really ) and revive our little fishy friend. This is taking all the money away from this tourist attraction and just to save one fish, which frankly is really ugly. Imagine the minerals being washed away. The stone will be weak and will cause rock avalanches. All these horrible consequence just for one fish. I have knowledge of the chain effect and although it causes more devastating consequences it is my nature to go against the flow. This article struck my brother and I found it quite a good debating topic. These are my reasons of why this is a bizarre act

Ban Bully video game, activists say

An anti-bullying committee wants to ban a video game because it is related to bullying.

Katie New and Robert Frenette who founded BullyingCanada.ca. They rote for all the victims: “on behalf of all the victims of bullying” sad New. On research they found out that violent video games can provoke bullying said New. A teacher went to other country to not sell this video game. The group asked its members to approach retailers.

As a teacher she said if I can to anything against bullying or violins it is good.

Just like high school

The game, an updated version of Bully released in 2006, features a 15-year-old student has to make him self a way in the new environment where there are cliques and bullies jump students in the halls. "This is an angst-filled game this is a simulation of the horrors high school there are no guns, no blood and no boosting of cars says Hilary Goldstein. You have to diplomacy or fighting, and you can even win kisses, from girls or boys. This is similar to teen TV drama. The bully’s will say it is fun but it instant fun to hurt other people. It would be help full to sell these games. The Canadian federation is trying to go with a British teacher group to not sell this video game. The Bully games were developed by Rock star Games of Vancouver, which also sells Grand Theft Auto.

I like this project because:

This will help to stop bullying a bit. I like it to because it will be a violent game less. So more people can under stand not to play violent games because you mite start bullying.

randomness

Random

This article was about probability, randomness and how you can test it by flipping a coin. What I thought was that if you think really hard about what you want the coin to land on it will land on that face. Bu that’s just what I think. What I know is that everything relies on chance, and if you don’t think it does then you just try it for yourself. Take a coin and flip it 20 times and see how many times it lands on heads and tails. Then ask someone to take a piece of paper and write 20 random h’s and t’s then write both the lists on the board. After ask someone to try to guess which one is the random one and which one is the coin flip.

A new way to watch TV
Hulu the name of the company is trying to put TV shows on to the internet and see if they get lot's of visitors. Hulu CEO calls this a "defining moment". Fox the TV shows this is stupid. in one year's sallery Hulu will pay 15 million dollars. i don't think this is a smart idea. they are started already and they started in the debut of March. i think this a kind of stupid idea because they are just wasting 15 million dollars a year and 30 million in two years, when visitors can just go on You Tube for free and put on our watch video's
RYAN SMITH

Hair Detectives

The article talks about a new method to know where people have been because of their hair.
Our body is full of hydrogen and oxygen, and this elements end up in our tissues, and hair.
But as not all atoms are the same, they vary in how much they weigh. Different forms of a single element are called isotopes. And depending on where you live, tap water contains unique proportions of the heavier and lighter isotopes of hydrogen and oxygen.
Scientists made tests, they went to a barbe shop and collect hair from different people, they check it and realized that they all lived in the same area, so this metod works, not every time because water in different places can be the same, but this might help a lot in the future to know about crimes, and different types of stuff.

What I think about this article is that it's such a good way to find out where people have been and figure out about crimes, maybe not to find out who was the person that did the crime, but to be close, to know where he or she was and it might help a lot.
Or maybe it can't work all the time because the water, as they say can be the same in many different places or maybe the people just drink imported water, but who knows.
But it is really impresive to know that science is so advance and that by looking at your hair scientists can know where have you been and where are you from and maybe in some day in the near future they can know who were your great great great great great grandparents.
I would like to know more about this kind of stuff.

Girl Talk: Are Women Really Better at Language?

This article is scientifically about girls learning language easier than boys. They did language tests on both boys and girls giving them words to either read or were read to them. Then they had to decide different things about two words, such as whether they rhymed or if they were spelled similar. They studied different parts of the brain between girls and boys. In the end they found that girls would learn language more easily because they can learn both orally and visually but boys would learn only one way.

My thoughts about this were that this did not make me happy as I am a boy but on the other hand I agree with the study. In my classes, girls tend to get the answers faster than the boys but not always. There are some smart men in the world especially in history. I would like to think that all boys are smarter than girls but I guess this study proves that theory wrong!