Taylor Gordon, Author at Blerds

February 2, 2015February 2, 2015

10 Free or Inexpensive Educational Apps That Could Help Underprivileged Students Close the Racial Achievement Gap

Sushi Monster

A 2010 report by The New York Times revealed that only 12 percent of Black boys in the eighth grade were proficient in math compared to more than 40 percent of their white counterparts. A Harvard researcher explained that there are often major “racial differences” in the foundation that Black students have when compared to white students, especially in the area of math. Sushi Monster can help change that by giving Black students exposure to math at an early stage and disguising it as nothing more than a fun game. The free app from Scholastic helps students practice addition and multiplication skills. The app earned an impressive four-star rating after more than 800 users weighed in on the app’s effectiveness. While many parents admitted that the app was challenging, which is essentially the point of the app, they also said they noticed an improvement in their child’s overall understanding of and interest in math.

Science360

Getting students interested in science is a major part of the battle to help them excel in the subject. For schools with more sufficient funding, science fairs, field trips and other school-funded activities help get students interested and engaged in science in a way that helps them understand the concepts they learn in the classroom. For underprivileged schools that can’t offer those same experiences, Science360 can be a huge plus. The National Science Foundation’s app makes the most out of fascinating photos, intriguing videos and other digital content to show students just how interesting science can be. With a news feed that updates students on scientific news, they are also able to see their course lessons reflected in real world discussions in the science community.

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February 2, 2015February 2, 2015

Jay Z’s Latest Power Move Would Bring Him Into Music Distribution With Premium Streaming Services

“I’m not a businessman. I’m a business, man!”

Jay Z said it, and he certainly meant it.

The hip-hop mogul’s latest power move could bring HOV into the music-distribution game as he is reportedly preparing to buy the Swedish tech company Aspiro.

Reports surfaced saying Jay Z is offering 464 million Swedish crowns for the company.

That’s roughly $56 million in U.S. dollars.

He’s also offering the entire amount in cash.

If he does add Aspiro to his rapidly growing empire, it will give him ownership of two streaming services — WiMP and Tidal.

At first glance it seems like he would be preparing to battle it out with other streaming services like Pandora or Spotify, but a closer look reveals that might not exactly be the case.

Both of the soon-to-be acquired streaming services would be described by some music heads as more “premium” services compared to services like Spotify.

It’s not just for the everyday man who wants to get his fill of old-school jams or the newest hip-hop tracks. This would be for the dedicated music head who doesn’t just want to listen to new songs. He wants to read about new artists and discover the stories behind their favorite tracks.

Both WiMP and Tidal offer daily track recommendations for users along with interviews and curated playlists.

With all the extra content, the subscription price is much higher than the services most music lovers are used to.

While Spotify only costs about $10 a month, Tidal will cost $19.99 a month, but it will also give users access to more than 25 million tracks and a whopping 75,000 music videos.

There is also a major difference in the markets here.

Currently, WiMP is only available in Denmark, Germany, Norway, Poland and Sweden.

Of course, if the hip-hop mogul takes over, there is no telling where he might want to take the services next or how he might want to rebrand them.

If Jay Z closes on the deal, he will make the purchase via another project few people know he already has — Project Panther Bidco.

Project Panther has been keeping tabs on Aspiro for some time, The Verge reported, saying that the company was an “innovative high-quality company with strong future growth potential.”

If the deal goes through then Jay Z will join other music greats like Neil Young and Dr. Dre as musicians who crossed the line from artists into distribution through streaming services.

January 30, 2015January 30, 2015

8 Apps You’ll Need to Make the Most Out of Your Super Bowl Experience

Fancred

Fancred just might be the most important app for some fans. Before, during and after the game, social media will be jam-packed with trash talking, cheering, embarrassing GIFs and hilarious memes — we all know how quickly Black Twitter works with these things. If you’re on the losing end of the game, you might not appreciate all the jokes until you have some time to give yourself a pep talk. Fancred will allow you to log online and chat it up with other fans who were rooting for your team while avoiding all the people who have come away feeling victorious. Fancred will also pull in photos, news stories and other digital content about your team and keep you safely tucked away from anymore bad news.

Super Bowl XLIX Digital Game Program

This is the perfect app for diehard football fans and football newcomers alike. It essentially helps boost the Super Bowl Sunday experience by giving users access to the official game program, recaps of the current season, exclusive video clips and more. So for the avid watcher, it’s a nice trip down memory lane to remember all the moments that led up to the Patriots vs. Seahawks showdown. For those who didn’t really keep up with the season, it’s a great way to get some quickie football knowledge before and during the game.

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January 30, 2015January 30, 2015

Atlanta Continues Mission to Become Startup Hub With New Incubator for Women Entrepreneurs in the Historic Flatiron Building

A new business incubator for female entrepreneurs will be housed in Atlanta’s historic Flatiron building, with hopes of giving a serious boost to economic growth within the city.

Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed plans to announce more details about the Women’s Entrepreneurship Initiative at an upcoming press conference.

Nearly every corner in downtown Atlanta reveals a new construction site. While the city’s face-lift is a nightmare when it comes to traffic, the potential of the major transformation gives new promise to emerging entrepreneurs in the city.

The Flatiron building is nestled near Georgia State University buildings, local dining hot spots and other popular office buildings in the city.

With a popular coffee shop at its base and access to local universities that are giving birth to entrepreneurial hopefuls, it’s a prime location for such an initiative hoping to cater to budding entrepreneurs.

Atlanta officials made it clear that they are hoping to stimulate the growth of small businesses and startups in the community and give the entire downtown area a major overhaul.

The 118-year-old Flatiron building is already expected to receive a major renovation, and it’s likely that moving the WEI into the building will help move that process along.

According to Reed, the initiative is a great way to give women-owned businesses the same jolt that tech startups have received recently.

“This is a space I thought needed some energy … women entrepreneurs are still having challenges with venture capital and seed investment,” Reed said, according to the Atlanta Business Chronicle.

Reed also pointed out that women entrepreneurs need access to safer office spaces.

With the building being in the center of a highly populated area full of students, campus patrols and nearby businesses, the Flatiron building would certainly be a safe office location.

A group of 15 women entrepreneurs will be selected to have their companies housed in the building free of charge.

That means they will receive free access to top-notch resources that could truly take their startups to the next level.

The center’s director, Theia Washington Smith, explained the initiative is the “direct result of a partnership between the city of Atlanta and Invest Atlanta” although some budget and operational expenses are “continuing to be developed.”

While WEI is one of the first incubators to be housed in the building, the entire space is expected to become an entrepreneurial hub soon.

Arun Nijhawan, managing principal for Lucror Resources, bought the Flatiron last year and planned to transform the building into a “collaborative place for Atlanta’s makers, thinkers and doers.”

January 29, 2015January 29, 2015

Apple Watch Scheduled to Hit Shelves This April, According to Apple CEO Tim Cook

Apple CEO Tim Cook finally released information that many people have been waiting for — when can consumers get their hands on an Apple Watch?

Cook recently announced during a quarterly earnings call with investors that the watch will be released this April, marking the first major new product release by Apple since it debuted the iPad back in 2010.

Apple teased tech lovers with their first look at the watch in September and promised it would be the company’s “most personal device ever.”

With buzz around the watch already stirring, Apple certainly has to deliver on its promises, but that’s something Cook isn’t worried about.

Cook is confident about the smartwatch’s development as well as the value app makers are already adding to the device.

“We’re making great progress in the development of it,” Cook said, according to The Verge.

He then added that the response from developers and app makers has been quite impressive.

“We’re seeing some incredible innovation,” he said.

Cook also had to defend the company against some anxious consumers who felt like April wasn’t quite early enough.

Some people claimed that the CEO’s decision to refer to April as an “early” part of 2015 was misleading.

According to the tech mogul’s calendar, however, “early” is exactly where April would fall.

He explained that Apple separates the year into three, fourth-month periods. The first period would be considered early, the next represents the middle and the last would be described as late.

Based on those terms, April would indeed be considered early 2015.

While some users wish the watches were coming out earlier, other consumers are still saving up for the device. The smartwatch will come with a pretty hefty price tag, starting at $349.

Three versions of the smartwatch will be available, with the most expensive option being the “ultra-premium Apple Watch Edition.”

This version of the watch has the potential to reach up to $1,000, with some people estimating a price even higher than that.

Of course, these are just speculations as Apple has not officially released any new pricing information or other news about what consumers should expect from the new product.

January 28, 2015January 28, 2015

Youth for Technology’s New Program Uses 3-D Printing to Get Girls in Africa Interested in STEM

Youth for Technology is taking a different approach to get girls in Africa interested in STEM subjects. While many programs and initiatives focus on coding or Web design, the 3D Africa program is making the most of 3-D printing technology to show the young girls just how fun STEM can be.

There has been an ongoing mission to get more Black girls interested in STEM careers, and that mission is especially dire in Africa.

African leaders and entrepreneurs believe investing in such technologies like 3-D printing could boost the continent’s economy.

Njideka Harry, the president and CEO of Youth for Technology, told TechCruch that 3-D printing “potentially could mitigate the unemployment situation in Africa by bridging the gap between education and employment.”

Harry said that 3-D printing alone is expected to generate roughly $550 billion a year worldwide by 2025.

That type of economic impact could cause major change across the continent but only if the next generation of innovators takes advantage of such opportunities.

Youth for Technology is vowing to make sure young African women are ready to compete in STEM careers and thrive in the 3-D printing industry.

It has already received a grant from Women Enhancing Technology (WeTech) to help fund the 3-D printing program and also launched an Indiegogo campaign to get more financial backing.

The program’s organizers believe 3-D printing is a great approach to getting girls interested in tech because the items they create will always serve was a reminder of the endless possibilities of science, technology, engineering and math.

The girls also will have to use all those skills in order to create their desired items with the printer.

Harry hopes it will encourage the young women to blaze their own trails in an industry that is currently dominated by men.

“There are cultural biases that hold that science is the domain of males and that it is not important for girls’ future lives and that girls are not as capable as boys when it comes to science learning,” Harry said.

Harry is hoping to boost young women’s confidence and inspire them to take more STEM subjects while they are still in school.

3D Africa will launch first in Nigeria, and Harry hopes to expand the program to other African countries after the first year.

January 26, 2015

New Wearable Brain Scanner Could Lead to Major Medical Breakthroughs

A team of scientists is currently developing a portable, wearable brain scanner that has the potential to lead to major breakthroughs in the medical field.

Current positron emission tomography (PET) scanners are large, bulky machines often used to detect cancer and measure the effects of certain cancer treatments.

They also can monitor blood flow to the heart, search for signs of coronary artery disease and much more.

PET scans give doctors and scientists a crucial look at the way our brains function, but the massive device hasn’t been able to reach its full potential.

There is currently no way for patients or test subjects to participate in physical activities while also undergoing a PET scan.

The new wearable version of the device is on the brink of changing that forever.

The helmet-like PET scanners are still very bulky, but they are portable enough to allow subjects to be active while wearing it.

“Every social experiment that has been done [in a brain scanner] is an artificially contrived experiment,” said Julie Brefczynski-Lewis, a neuroscientist at West Virginia University and one of the scientists leading the project, according to Live Science. “Here, you actually see what people are doing when they’re embarrassed, when they’re laughing, when they’re crying.”

That, researchers believe, could allow them to garner a better understanding of healthy brain functions and even provide more knowledge about neurological disorders like dementia, stroke and depression.

The possibilities of the wearable brain scanner concept, which was patented by Stan Majewski, got a lot of attention in the science community.

Brefczynski-Lewis and others then came together and teamed up with Majewski to start working on a prototype.

Building a wearable brain scanner is an expensive process, but funding for the project was made possible through the president’s BRAIN (Brain Research through Advancing Innovative Neurotechnologies) Initiative.

The National Institutes of Health awarded the research team $1.5 million through the initiative.

Some of the new possibilities with such a device would be the ability of researchers to monitor the brain of an autistic person in a social situation or monitor a stroke patient’s brain during rehab exercises.

Early testing with the prototype revealed that it is working efficiently, but not producing the type of quality results the researchers would want it to.

Studies on a “fake brain” revealed that while the device worked, the images it provided were fuzzier than they would be on the typical PET images.

As the team continues to try and improve the scanner’s results, the wearable scanners could make their medical debut soon.

January 23, 2015January 23, 2015

Google ‘Nova’ Rumors Suggest the Tech Giant Could Become New Wireless Carrier This Year

Recent reports have surfaced that suggest Google is well on its way to becoming a major mobile carrier and even further expanding its reach into the telecommunications market.

Google is one tech giant that has done it all over the years, including helping consumers find answers to the embarrassing questions they didn’t want to ask their friends, taking over the largest video-sharing platform to help spread the joy of cat videos through YouTube, making geology class a little more bearable with Google Earth and challenging discussions of privacy in America with the development of Google Glass.

With self-driving cars and futuristic glucose-level tracking contact lenses also in development, Google has always been the tech giant with amazing tricks up its sleeve.

Now, Google is allegedly preparing for a mobile carrier takeover.

According to a report by The Information, Google could soon be selling mobile phone plans directly to consumers thanks to project “Nova,” which is supposed to be headed by Nick Fox, the vice president of product development at Google.

The report claims that Google will essentially be teaming up with Sprint and T-Mobile in order to bring “Nova” to life and become a Mobile Virtual Network Operator (MVNO).

The plan, allegedly, is for Google to buy space on Sprint and T-Mobile airwaves and then sell its own packages directly to consumers.

It’s essentially the same business model behind other MVNOs like Virgin Mobile and Straight Talk. The difference here, however, is that “Nova” would be taking advantage of two mobile carriers’ airwaves as opposed to the one that most MVNOs have access to.

In other words, the idea itself is not revolutionary by any stretch of the imagination, but it is certainly a big move on Google’s behalf.

Other reports also hinted that Google, in its true innovative fashion, is developing new communication apps to work on the Nova network.

If the rumors are true, Google is on schedule to launch the new services later this year.

January 22, 2015January 22, 2015

Microsoft’s HoloLens to Make It Possible for Scientists to Walk Around on Mars From the Comfort of Their Offices

Microsoft’s latest collaboration with NASA will give scientists the ability to explore Mars without actually stepping foot on the Red Planet.

While many people assumed the future of space exploration involved getting more astronauts to land on other planets, Microsoft’s HoloLens has opened the door for virtual space exploration.

The HoloLens headset makes the most out of 3-D simulations and virtual environment projections to create a detailed holographic image of Mars.

NASA’s Pasadena, California-based Jet Propulsion Laboratory is developing the new platform called OnSight, and the developers are hopeful that the new device could significantly accelerate space exploration.

“OnSight gives our rover scientists the ability to walk around and explore Mars right from their offices,” Dave Lavery, program executive of NASA’s Mars Science Laboratory, explained in a press release.

With NASA’s help, the HoloLens will go beyond creating your average Mars look-a-like.

Instead, the device will use actual images and data from NASA’s Curiosity rover.

This means the researchers will also be able to see live readings and data come in over the headset as well as getting a live, virtual look at the planet.

As they explore the planet, the scientists will also be able to assign activities for the rover to complete and see simulations of what the results will likely be.

The project is truly extending the possibilities of the HoloLens, which many tech-lovers anxiously awaited for gaming purposes or for better ways to interact with loved ones from miles away.

If OnSight proves to be successful, the headset will be much more than a breakthrough in communication and entertainment; it would pioneer the future of remote space exploration.

“Previously, our Mars explorers have been stuck on one side of a computer screen,” said Jeff Norris, the OnSight project manager. “This tool gives them the ability to explore the rover’s surroundings much as an Earth geologist would do field work here on our planet.”

Later this year, NASA plans to use the OnSight technology for multiple rover operations and embark on a remote Curiosity mission.

January 22, 2015January 22, 2015

Beyond the Flying Car: 10 Futuristic Modes of Transportation Everyone Should Know About

The Space Elevator

There was once a time when having the first man step foot on the moon was a daunting task and one that many people thought was certainly impossible. Now that several men and women have boldly gone where so few have ever gone before, engineers have their sights set on the future — an elevator to space. LiftPort Group, headed by former NASA researcher Michael Laine, said it could build an elevator to the moon using technology that is already available. With another Japan-based company making the same claim, one can only wonder if the next great space race will be a race to build the first elevator into outer space.

Orbital Maglev

This transit system literally takes other public transportation out of this world. It would essentially be a rail system in space and allow riders to travel freely from outer space back to Earth. With the idea of “space tourism” becoming a hot trend for researchers, the idea is an interesting one. Based on today’s technology, however, it will be quite some time before the expensive project is ever brought to life.

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