TikTok-ing Your World

With over 800 million monthly active users according to Hootsuite’s 2020 report, TikTok is taking the social-media world by storm. With the mission of inspiring creativity and bringing joy to users, TikTok has become the leading destination for short-form mobile videos.

With global offices all over the world, Los Angeles, New York, London, Paris, Berlin, Dubai, Mumbai, Singapore, Jakarta, Seoul, and Tokyo, the social platform is leaving its mark wherever it goes.

Catering fundamentally the digital cravings of Generation Z, the children of Generation X  and sometimes Millennials, the app offers meme enthusiasts the possibility to go viral thanks to their videos. Being user friendly and very straight forward, TikTok overpowers other apps such as Instagram and Snapchat when it comes to how easy it is to edit and upload videos.  Leveraging on how addictive and content oriented it is, the app doesn’t offer tutorials or sign-up option. It directs you directly to its content.

In a fast-paced world with an ever-shortening attention span, the creative and entertaining platform has everything to hook up users especially that it uses an algorithm to learn user preferences and then provide them with customized video feeds.

Gregory Galant, co-founder of Shorty Awards  attributes TikTok’s success to the fact that the majority of people love music and like goofing around. Therefore, the app’s steady stream of new dances, songs, and challenges, offers users the opportunity to express themselves in a creative way as well as connect with other talents.

In a strategically smart marketing bid, TikTok used Instagram to build its notoriety and audience. Offering users the possibility to share videos on Instagram stories,  it was able to use Influencers to market the platform.

While TV advertisers spend thousands to produce a 30sec video able to capture audience’s attention , TikTok users are having the same opportunity without cost.

TikTok, being a Chinese video-sharing social networking service owned by ByteDance, has faced its share of conspiracy theories, however it didn’t stop the app’s popularity from growing worldwide. If you are not yet a fan of the app, you might want to TikTok your way to it. It is worth checking-out to know what the buzz is all about.

 

Newron Motors

Enjoy the label of being a thrill seeker and a rebel with an environmental cause with Newron Motors, which allows you to experience a wild ride with wind in your hair as you ride an environment-friendly timeless and delicate looking electric motorcycle, tailor-made at “l’atelier de confection”.

The original Newron Motors, electric motorcycle, targets true connoisseurs who are seeking a new experience. With its e-intelligence, its capacity to self-assess its power supply in order to  reach the desired destination to ensure there is, a maintenance signal to remind riders that is time for a check-up. Aside from its beautiful exterior, the design is minimalist; the motorcycle has only one swing arm on its right-hand side and a driveshaft on the left, while the motor is tucked away neatly.

The innovative French Newron Motors was established in 2016, by Sébastien MAHUT, Electronic engineer and electric propulsion expert, and Michel SERAFIN, Systems design engineer and manager.

Not-for-profit Search Engine

Environmentalist rejoice, we found the perfect search engine for you. Ecosia is the world’s largest not-for-profit search engine based in Berlin, Germany, that plants trees by donating 80% or more of its profits to nonprofit organizations that focus on Reforestation.

On its landing page, you find the number of trees planted thanks to the number of users who resorted to searching through the engine.

In 2018, Ecosia’s CEO, Christian Kroll, answered users demands over finding a way to permanently save the Hambach Forest. This resulted in Ecosia,  offered €1 million to buy and save the last remaining stretch of the Hambach Forest in Germany.

Founded in 2009, Ecosia,has honored its promise and planted over 40 million trees  across 19 planting sites worldwide. The company is planning for more by end of 2019. In Autumn, Ecosia has even taken her mission a step forward by giving away shares to the Purpose Foundation, to ensure that founders can never profit. Ecosia also has its own solar plant for renewable energy.

Thymtastic By AkelTech

Manoushe , a beloved Lebanese street food and a foreigners’ favorite, widely recognized and praised around the world. Manoushe is the Lebanese version of a pizza, it is generally eaten as a breakfast on-the-go, its crispy dough  topped with delicious zaatar (thyme) awakens all senses. It has been the talk-of-the-town and the center of many articles in renowned publications such as The Guardian, New York Times ..etc.

Engineer Abed Jawhar who spent his life providing automation solutions for the likes of PepsiCo, Coca-Cola, Mars, Snickers and Procter & Gamble, decided to launch his own business: AkelTech, with food vending machines with customized features for high-quality food products.

As a ground-breaking new release, AkelTech launched a first of its kind “Manoushe ” Vending Machine called Thymtastic.

The Manoushe -producing vending machine, which was announced during the Arabnet Beirut 2019 conference last June, showed how  Manoushes  are baked inside the vending machine in only 2 minutes and enjoyed for the meager sum of $1.

Thymtastic offers all kinds of Manoushes: thyme, cheese, and kishk, with different kinds of dough: protein-based, gluten-free, brown bread, and multi-cereal.

Top Original Gadgets

Sometimes nothing like cute gadgets to brighten your day. They might not be essential, but they add an element of fun and comfort.

Many fun ideas are out there , and creative people tend to come up with the odds things, marketing them through a great platform called Kickstarter for crowd funding. Hereby is our selection of cool gadgets we wished hit the market.

 

The WATCHme is a cute little charging stand for smartwatch, the cute cyclop monster has not only a decorative component to it but offers companionship while charging your wearable technology such as smart watches…etc.

Whilst some people have green hands, others have lethal ones. So for that person in your life who always manages to kill every plant you bring it, Lua might be the perfect solution. Because plants have needs now thanks to Lua they can communicate them to you. It offers the perfect solution to maintain your greenery and makes you skip the hassle of an intricate setup: the free mobile app only requires an internet connection once for the download, and is then operational, even offline.

Lua offers 6 animations, directly related to the plant’s health and overall well-being, while the 9 others gives Lua and your plant, a spark of life.

• Thirsty: When soil moisture drops under the defined threshold, you need to water your plant.

• Sick: Too much water can kill your plant too, wait until Lua is thirsty to add water.

• Vampire: After a few days Lua will turn into a vampire if exposure to light is not sufficient.

• Squint: Too much exposure to light can harm your plant, when Lua is squinting it’s looking for shade.

• Cold: When the temperature drops. Lua will sneeze the day after.

• Hot: Lua is too hot.

• Happy: Lua is back to normal.

• Puzzled: Lua couldn’t read your QR code.

• Wink: You showed a QR code to Lua and it understood it.

• Tired: Lua will go back to sleep when there’s no movement in front of it.

• Wake-up: When Lua senses a movement.

• Grumpy: Random animation. If stretch goal #2 is reached, Lua will look grumpy when there’s a good chance of rain.

• Tongue sticking out: Random animation.

 

 Lua uses 4 sensors to assist you in monitoring your plant’s well-being: Water level sensor, light sensor, motion sensor and temperature sensor.

Lua detects a movement and follows it with the eyes. If nothing happens, Lua will go back to sleep.

With Lua your favorite plant becomes a breathing, living, animated virtual pet. It offers companionship on those lonely days. It’s the perfect addition to your inner garden houseplants: its playful/cheerful/lively personality makes it the ideal plant companion.

Lets go back to the past, where chivalry and romance reigned supreme, the era of poetry and greatness, of courtship and delicateness. With Plume, you can experience the authenticity of writing notes rather than typing them. Plume is a fountain pen with an ergonomic grip, blending past and present.

What if your remote was a bear with attitude, a pet who you have to get acquainted with whilst it learns your habits and preferences?!

That’s Bearbot, a cute universal remote at your command.Once tamed, by performing specific gestures to teach him how to control numerous household devices, your universal remote becomes a very reliable and expressive companion which interacts with you but can still surprise you with spontaneous behaviors (sneezing, yawning and more…).

Bearbot is available for adoption as well as his cub, mini Bearbot an infrared relay.

 

The world of gadgets is a very vast one, once you go into it it is hard to get out. The trick is to know where to look and how to choose.

 

Fujifilm Unique Camera

Fujifilm released its latest innovation: The instax mini LiPlay boasts. The ground breaking camera’s small size fits just about anywhere and is perfect for on-the-go.

Available in three slick colors: ELEGANT BLACK, BLUSH GOLD, STONE WHITE it is packed with a lot of unique features like:

• The possibility of using  the display screen to get the best shot and select the images to print.

• The ability to convert recorded sounds into a QR code and add it to the photo. Thus allowing users to replay the sound and relive the moment just by scanning the QR code with their smartphone.
• The option of printing pictures from their smartphones.

It only takes about 12 seconds to send and print your images.  Plus, around 100 photos can be printed on a single charge. A shutter button is also available in order to easily capture group photos by using users’ smartphone.

3D Circus

In 1976, inspired by Austrian Peter Hajek, “Sarah Roncalli, Tochter des Mondes”, Bernhard Paul and André Heller teamed up and launched a German circus: Circus Roncalli.

The circus is one of the oldest and most successful circuses in Europe, it owns the largest circus collections in the world, including old costumes, circus books and posters, which they plan to display in a museum.

Bernhard Paul and André Heller have always been visionaries. It is thanks to their perseverance and trend-setting thinking that they managed to sustain their shows for decades. That is why, in order to follow current times and please conscientious clients, Circus Roncalli decided to replace live animals with holographic ones thus joining the fight against animal cruelty which circuses have been accused of for years.

Thanks to Bluebox and Optoma projectors , clients can see the 3D animals from their seat no matter where they are seated in the room.

The circus collaborated with Bluebox to create stunning visuals. Eleven ZU 850 laser projectors were used to create the holographic animals that include prancing horses and fierce lions.

Death Defying Swimming Pool

Compass Ceramic Pools is a UK company specialized in the professional installation of indoor and outdoor pools which has forged a solid reputation turning fantasy pools into reality.  In one of their most daring endeavor yet, Compass Ceramic decided to set-up a death defying swimming pool with a 360 degrees view of London.  The new architecture set in central London, will allow visitors to float over 200 meters above the capital’s skyline.

Pool designers at Compass Pools have developed Infinity London, the only building in the world to incorporate a 360-degree infinity pool. The concept, also referred to by the Greek lemniscate symbol (∞), features a 600,000-litre pool built right on top of a 55-storey building. The pool is made from cast acrylic rather than glass, as this material transmits light at a similar wavelength to water so that the pool will look perfectly clear.

The floor of the pool is also transparent, allowing visitors to see the swimmers and sky above. Swimmers will access the pool through a rotating spiral staircase based on the door of a submarine, rising from the pool floor when someone wants to get in or out.

Other advanced technical features include a built-in anemometer to monitor the wind speed. This is linked to a computer-controlled building management system to ensure the pool stays at the right temperature and water doesn’t get blown down to the streets below. Boasting an innovative twist on renewable energy, the pool’s heating system will use waste energy from the air condition system for the building. The hot gas that is produced as a by-product of creating cold air in the building will run through a heat exchanger to heat the water for the pool.

The pool is also fitted with a full spectrum of lights which will give the building the appearance of a sparkling jewel-topped torch at night.

Infinity London could kick off construction as early as 2020 if all the partners and contractors are confirmed. It will have a five-star international hotel on the top floors of the building with the pool used by the guests.

Infinity London’s exact location is yet to be confirmed.

 

 

Facebook Crypto-currency

Facebook, the American online social media platform, headed by founder Mark Zuckerberg, is planning to launch into the world of digital currency, a type of  currency available in electronic form, with Libra.

Libra, the newly founded entity powered by Facebook will launch in 2020. To date, 28 organizations from around the world announced plans to join the association.

Libra’s main goal is to reinvent money, transform the global economy, thus allowing people everywhere better lives. Libra will be accessible to anyone with an entry-level smartphone and data.

Facebook is also launching a subsidiary company, Calibra, which will be building financial services for Libra. Calibra’s first product will be a digital wallet for Libra, which will be available as: a standalone app and can be found in: Messenger and WhatsApp.

Libra presents several advantages:

• It’s quick and easy, no matter where you are sending, or spending, your money.
• It’s available around the world.
• It’s secure as it is built on a blockchain designed with security in mind.

With Libra, Facebook is planning to reshape the transform the global economy.

The Mysterious Safe

The Vermilion Heritage Museum takes you on a trip across Vermilion’s captivating history. Located in the former S. R. P. Cooper School, the museum exhibits several items depicting the life and times of the early settlers of this area.

Among the museum’s prized objects is a huge sealed metal safe, dating back to 1990s, donated by Brunswick hotel. The safe’s combination was displaced decades ago thus, making it impossible to open. Neither the hotel’s staff nor the museum’s employees knew what was in it.

Neither the safe’s manufacturer nor the town’s locksmiths were able to unlock it due to years of inactivity that might have slowed down the finicky gears, rendering it inoperable.

Faced with the reality of never being able to open the safe, the museum decided to suggest to visitors to try their luck at guessing the combination. Millions failed, until recently: a regular man by the name of Stephen Mills, against all odds, was able to unlock it.

The Alberta resident was visiting the museum with his family during the holiday and came across the safe. The museum’s guide briefed him about its history so Mills, in an attempt to amuse and impress his kids, asked to try and guess the combination. It never came to his mind that he would actually succeed.

After pressing his ear against the safe, he tried a random combination, he turned clockwise three times to 20, counter-clockwise two times to 40, and then clockwise one time to 60, unlocking the safe.

In awe, everyone gathered to uncover the safe’s content which was a 70s waiter’s order book and a pay slip.