An Elephant That Speaks

 Koshik, an elephant who resides at the Everland Zoo in South Korea, has astounded scientists — it seems he can talk.

The 22-year-old elephant can apparently mimic several words in Korean, including “annyong” (“hello”), “anja” (sit down”), “aniya” (“no”), “nuo” (“lie down”)  and “choah” (“good’).   Many of these words were used by Koshik’s trainers over the years, but whether Koshik comprehends what he is saying is still in question.

In a study published today in Current Biology that draws on research from Austria, Germany, Sri Lanka and South Korea, scientists had several Korean speakers listen to a recording of Koshik’s words, and then had them write down what they’d heard.  They all agreed:  They could understand certain of Koshik’s words

“We compared the structure of Koshik’s speech utterances to natural Asian elephant calls, finding that Koshik’s imitations are very different from the calls that Asian elephants produce naturally,” researcher Angela Stoeger at the University of Vienna wrote in an email to ABC News.

When asked if Koshik’s vocalizations were an attempt to communicate, Stoeger said “that is difficult to answer. Koshik mainly seems to be using these vocalizations as a way of bonding with people, rather than for their meaning.” 

Daniel Mietchen, who was also involved in the study, said in an email that “Elephants communicate with humans in multiple ways already, and vocal imitation is not necessarily for that.”

Unlike humans, elephants do not have lips but instead have large trunks through which they blow air, emitting a low-pitch sound. Koshik, however, places his trunk in his mouth to mimic words he hears.

The researchers can’t say exactly how Koshik learned to vocalize these few select Korean words, but they believe that Koshik’s growing up as the only elephant at Everland Zoo for five years played a part.

“During this time, he was trained to physically obey several commands and was exposed to human speech intensively by his trainers, veterinarians, guides and tourists. The decisive factor for speech imitation in Koshik may thus be that humans were the only social contact available during an important period of bonding and development,” Stoeger said in an email.

“The finding of Koshik imitating speech provides evidence that Asian elephants are among the species capable of vocal learning,” said Mietchen.

Birds, dolphins and whales also have this ability.

Stoeger called Koshik a clever elephant, who while much focused on humans also liked to interact with his female companion. “He seems to be a normal Asian elephant living in a zoo,” Stoeger said.

Nevertheless, there is something special about Koshik.

Source : abcnews[dot]go[dot]com

Smartype – the key(s) to faster typing?

Are you more of a 40-words-per-hour typist than 40-a-minute? If so, the Smartype keyboard, with its built-in screen, could help you work more efficiently.

If you’re a two-fingered typist who spends more time looking for letters than actually hitting them, then a new kind of keyboard from KeyView may be able to help.

The keyboard, called the Smartype, features a narrow screen located just above the top row of keys, which displays what you’re typing as you type. Its maker claims the Smartype keyboard reduces typing errors, helps users type faster, and reduces eye and neck strain. And because you’re not constantly searching for letters or correcting mistakes, it should also help you to concentrate better on the task in hand.

The screen can also be used to display information such as your Facebook or Twitter feed. Email notifications, weather data and even stats relating to your computer’s performance can also be shown.

For beginner typists, the Smartype could well provide a path to faster typing, as presumably you’d get a better feel for the keys more quickly than if you’re always glancing up at the screen and back down again at the keyboard.

Touch typists, on the other hand, will probably find it of limited use, unless the idea of using the screen as an information portal appeals.

The Smartype keyboard isn’t yet available, though according to its website, it’s coming soon. No price is stated either.

If you’re the kind of person who yearns to be more Usain Bolt than Timmy the tortoise when it comes to bashing the keys, do you think the Smartype might be the answer?

[via The Verge]

Source : digitaltrends[dot]com

LOLZ: Photobomb, Wikipedian, and other tech lingos now part of Oxford Dictionary

Well, isn't this ridic? Some crafty new words have been added to the Oxford Dictionary, ranging from techy to strange, to say the least.

The Oxford English Dictionary is frequently updated to keep in trend with our ever-changing colloquial. But these August 2012 additions might give you the lolz: Plenty of Internet-related lingos have been officially initiated as part of the English language as per the dictionary’s standard. While some of these make perfect sense, such as UX and Hackathon, some of the other ones seems, well, ridic:

lolz, fun, laughter, or amusement

ridic, ridiculous

photobomb, spoil a photograph of (a person or thing) by suddenly appearing in the camera’s field of view as the picture is taken, typically as a prank or practical joke

UX, short for user experience

tweeps, a person’s followers on the social networking site Twitter

e-cigarette, another term for electronic cigarette

hat tip, (in online contexts) used as an acknowledgement that someone has brought a piece of information to the writer’s attention, or provided the inspiration for a piece of writing

Wikipedian, a person who contributes to the collaboratively written online encyclopedia Wikipedia, especially on a regular basis

ethnical hacker, a person who hacks into a computer network in order to test or evaluate its security, rather than with malicious or criminal intent

Hackathon, an event, typically lasting several days, in which a large number of people meet to engage in collaborative computer programming

“The world of technology remains a major influence on the English language,” reads the Oxford Dictionary blog, which announced the new word additions. These words come in conjunction with other tech-related jargon, such as 3D printing and sexting, which was added last year.

Several non-techy words have been added as well that make us shake our heads in shame. Some of them we wondered why they weren’t part of the English vocabulary (officially) before, while others just shouldn’t be a thing. We think you’ll know what we’re referring to in this list:

genius, exceptional intellectual or creative power or other natural ability

date night, a prearranged occasion on which an established couple, esp. one with children, go for a night out together.

video chat, a face-to-face conversation held over the Internet by means of webcams and dedicated software

group hug, an instance of a number of people gathering together to hug each other, typically to provide support or express solidarity:

mwahahaha, used to represent laughter, especially manic or cackling laughter such as that uttered by a villainous character in a cartoon or comic strip

douche, an obnoxious or contemptible person, typically a man

soul patch, a small tuft of facial hair directly below a man’s lower lip. 

vajazzle, adorn the pubic area of (a woman) with crystals, glitter, or other decoration

“The rich variety of new words from all manner of sources and levels of formality — popular culture, science, technology, politics, etc. — is striking in this update,” said Oxford’s Head of Online Dictionaries Glynnis Keir in a statement. While it’s great to see some regularly used words added as an official part of the English language, there’s just that bit of irony how our language is beginning to sound less articulate than ever.

 

See a bigger list of freshly added words to the Oxford Dictionary here.

Source : digitaltrends[dot]com

Hands on with App.net, the pay-for Twitter disruption platform

In the wake of Twitter's harsh words for outside developers, App.net managed to surpass its funding goals and launch an alpha service. Check out our first impressions.

The Dalton Caldwell blog post-inspired App.net has been hatching plans to take on Twitter with its pay-for model for weeks now. At last report, the platform was well short of its $500k goal, but over the last week, the hype and interest was enough to tip App.net over the edge ahead of its deadline.

“Thank you for believing,” Caldwell wrote on Saturday. “I know in my heart that what made join.app.net succeed was your willingness and openness to give App.net the benefit of the doubt, to read our github documentation, to ask to participate in the alpha, to write blogposts in our support. Thank you.”

Now, the alpha version is up and running.

Interface

App.net’s interface is, to summarize, bare bones. You have a mere four landing pages you can check out: Your personal stream (posts from those you’re following), your posts, mentions, and the global feed. It’s certainly more sparse than Twitter, both in what and how you navigate, and its looks. While you have a Facebook-like profile page complete with a personal picture and cover photo, the rest of the site is quite stark.

And front and center, in big, bold, plain type, is a export tool for grabbing all of your App.net-posted data.

Actions

There’s a lot of work to be done, clearly, so plenty is going to fall onto the “what’s missing” list, but that’s to be expected. That said, let’s dive in.

Instead of 140 characters, you get 256. You can reply to other people’s posts (which a small handful are referring to as “appdates”), but there are no “retweet” or favorite options. You can select and view individual posts for backlinking purposes, which is incredibly helpful when using content for news breaking reference. 

It can probably go without saying that multimedia features like sharing photos and videos haven’t been added to App.net, but the developer community is so enthused about the platform that the building is coming fast and furious.

In development

Which brings us to a quick note on all the building that’s happening around App.net. Much of the reason for starting App.net in the first place revolved around how platforms exist and interact with their third-party developer ecosystems. Twitter’s continued distancing between itself and outside developers was a big part of the inspiration. So it’s only fitting that much of the discussion on the alpha site revolves around the third-party community.

Web and mobile apps are in the works, as are desktop and browser extensions. You can check out the in-progress catalogue over at Github. And there are a few fun tools already at your disposal, like this app that finds your Twitter friends already using App.net, and this one that shows an endless stream of posts as they’re published, in real time.

Users

There are a few problems that come with alternative social networks. The main one, of course, is building the userbase. As it can be assumed, Twitter’s numbers are far great than App.net’s… obviously. And the fact that there’s no native way to find people can make diving in a little intimidating. You’re just sort of thrown in the mess, although you can use the aforementioned tool that helps you find Twitter users you know using the application to help out.

The other intimidating thing about jumping into App.net is the community – or rather, it can be intimidating. Think about the type of people interested in paying at least $50 to start using a real-time communication application – so yes, it’s pretty tech-oriented. There’s a lot of developer-speak and a lot of App.net-speak. It’s pretty narrow.

To be fair, this means that the obnoxious drivel that Twitter often dissolves to hasn’t hit the site (at least not yet). It’s a relief not to be flooded with constant celebrity news and pictures of food, if we’re being honest.

The other element that hasn’t invaded App.net (again, yet) are spambots. The price gate is certainly helping, as is its just-launched status, although there’s no chance the platform will be able to remain spam free. Regardless, it definitely shouldn’t dissolve into the massive cesspool of fake users that has engulfed Twitter’s basement.

Conclusion

App.net is ambitious and exciting, but it’s not a solid bet quite yet. There are also already rumors that there will be a free tier of App.net, and I’d certainly suggest waiting until we hear more on that.

As it stands, it’s interesting to be part of the early crew. And if you ever wished you could have been a part of the early Twitter machine and all the user-sourced development that happened way back when, then ante up that $50 and come on in. Otherwise, wait until there’s more outside app integration and native built-in controls.

The larger question, of course, is, does App.net stand a chance? It’s hard to say yes — but given Twitter’s fickle heart these does, it actually seems possible. I don’t want to beat a dead horse here, but Twitter isn’t the company that it used to be; its priorities are shifting. We can criticize and yell about it, but it Twitter wants to go ahead and be a media company — and it’s in a really good position to do that. It’s frustrated for many of its core users, but it’s still Twitter’s perogitive.

That means the timing is right: We have this brief moment where real-time communication is important and popular and where the largest player to date appears to be creating some market space. Paying for apps is a hard hurdle to cross, but it could deliver us from many of the issues our social networks have trapped us into. 

Source : digitaltrends[dot]com

Visit the First Website Ever Right Now to Celebrate Its 21st Birthday

Image credit: CERN

Twenty-one years ago today the first website was published. It looked just like this — basic text, with some words oddly highlighted.

On Aug. 6, 1991, Tim Berners-Lee, who is widely credited with inventing the World Wide Web, published that site from CERN, the world’s largest physics lab in Geneva, Switzerland. He used the machine pictured above — a NeXT computer — to create the page.

The page, as you can see now, explained the World Wide Web or W3 as a “wide-area hypermedia information retrieval initiative aiming to give universal access to a large universe of documents.” The first page has been preserved and republished by CERN, and according to ZDNet, the first web server is still powered on at the lab with a sign warning, “This machine is a server. DO NOT POWER DOWN!”

About a year after that website was published, in July 1992, the first photo was posted on the Web. It was of a comedian musical group. Berners-Lee was honored during the opening ceremony of the 2012 Olympics.

Source : abcnews[dot]go[dot]com