Video call conferences have become a part of our daily lives in the past months, and it seems that it will still be in the coming days.

When it comes to these video call conferences, a person in one normally has two things to worry about: his voice and his video. Because we don’t want people to hear or see some things in our home, oftentimes we find ourselves monitoring these two things during a video call. This is maybe why Logitech has developed this new mouse called the MX Anywhere 3. The said mouse has “customizable side buttons that control camera and mic settings during video chats”, which are real handy tools, if you ask me.

That’s not the only thing the two side buttons on the Anywhere 3 can do, but it’s the most interesting new setting you can choose. In addition to preset actions, there are app-specific actions you can choose from when customizing each button in the Logitech Options software. The newest ones let you press a side button to start/stop your video feed, or mute/unmute [your] mic, while on a Zoom or Microsoft Teams video call.

More details about this mouse over Engadget.

What are your thoughts about this one?

(Image Credit: Valentina Palladino / Engadget)

The police not only rely on manpower, but on dog power as well, especially when it comes to cases that require their skills, like in drug trafficking and weapons distribution. A police dog is not just a co-worker for the officer who is assigned with one; the dog is family, and one of the most painful experiences in life is losing a family member.

For Malaysian police officer Patrick Sandai, saying goodbye to his ageing K9 partner Tho couldn't get anymore difficult and heart-wrenching.

"I’ve lost my first colleague," says Sandai.

On September 19, 2020, Tho passed away due to complications associated with old age, at twelve years and eight months.

Tho knew when Sandai wasn’t having a great day, and he would rub against the legs of his human partner. Tho was a testament that a dog is indeed a man’s best friend.

Learn more about Tho’s life over at Mashable.

Rest in peace, doggo.

(Image Credit: New Straits Times/ Bernama/ Mashable)

Studio Ghibli has been known to be stern when it comes to the distribution and copyright of their films. However, it would seem that they are slowly changing their image through their recent actions.

… it’s come as a bit of a surprise to find the acclaimed animation studio finally releasing its once-firm grip on their movies this year, first with the release of their films on Netflix, and then with the free distribution of official backgrounds for Zoom meetings during the pandemic.

Perhaps the most surprising of all, as of now, is their recent announcement that they will be releasing 400 images for the public to use for free. The images will be from their eight films, such as Spirited Away, Ponyo, and The Tale of Princess Kaguya.

The images were released with this handwritten message from Ghibli producer Toshio Suzuki: “Please use them freely within the scope of common sense.”

[...]

The images, which can be downloaded from the official Studio Ghibli website, are a beautiful reminder of the stunning hand-drawn animated scenes produced by the studio. While they’re beautiful to browse through on their own, the images can also be used as screensavers, inspiration for artists and aspiring animators, or for printing out in glossy colour to decorate the walls of your home.

See some of the images over at SoraNews24.

Thanks, Studio Ghibli!

(Image Credit: Studio Ghibli/ SoraNews24)

The local government of the Mexican state of Nuevo León finally downgraded their alert level from red to orange on September 4. This means that locals are now allowed to hold celebrations such as weddings provided they still maintain a distance of five feet from each other. This wedding was one great example of the locals obeying the state government.

Footage shows the moment several couples on the dance floor make sure to stay inside socially-distant squares marked by tape.

[...]

The video goes on to show the rest of the venue as the just-married couple is also seen enjoying a dance, but, unlike their guests, were not confined to a box or wearing face masks.

The Mexican 'epidemiological traffic light' system was created to notify locals which state of emergency they are in depending on the number of people hospitalised due to COVID-19.

It goes from green to yellow to orange to red in order of how serious the situation is at the time.

Cool!

(Image Credit: Newsflash/ DailyMail)

New Frame Plus is back once again with another principle of animation. This time it’s about slow in and slow out (also known as ease in and ease out). In this video, Dan explains that by applying this principle, animators can make an animated character’s movements more natural and realistic, and not robotic and mechanical. This principle also helps the viewer to identify which objects in the scene are heavy, and which are light.

Learn more about this principle through this video.

(Video Credit: New Frame Plus/ YouTube)

Sometimes you don’t need to know the dish name. As long as it's edible, and it tastes delicious, then you can eat or sell it.

What do you think?

Image via Engrish.com

An international team of researchers led by Matthew Stewart have discovered human footprints in an ancient lake deposit in the Nefud desert in Saudi Arabia. Footprints of some animals, such as elephants, camels, and horses were also found. The footprints are estimated to be 112,000-121,000 years old. 

“We immediately realised the potential of these findings,” says Stewart. “Footprints are a unique form of fossil evidence in that they provide snapshots in time, typically representing a few hours or days, a resolution we tend not get from other records.”

From the size and orientation of the human footprints, there were likely two or three individuals travelling together.

Learn more details about this study over at Cosmos Magazine.

It’s amazing how some footprints could give us a glimpse of the past.

(Image Credit: Klint Janulis/ Cosmos)

Utah, U.S — World-class biker Paul Basagoitia has already charted the whole bike course inside his mind, and has already planned what he will do as he runs through the course. He steadies himself, and the 2015 Red Bull Rampage contest begins.

What makes the contest stand out - and one of the reasons it's been called the world's most extreme mountain biking competition - is that riders get to choose how they want to ride the terrain.

The aim is to successfully navigate your own line down the 1,000-vertical-foot mountain path - roughly equivalent to the height of The Shard, the tallest building in the UK.

[...]

"It's a very dangerous event but at the same time, it's the only event that we're able to showcase our true riding skills."

And show his true riding skills he did… but he failed to pull off the 40-ft landing. He overshot by just a couple of feet,

His pedal got caught on a branch and he flipped over his handlebars, down over a ledge and straight onto his back.

Paul had hit the ground perhaps hundreds of times. He had been knocked out before, and had suffered broken bones. He says that, compared to that fateful day, he has taken harder crashes. But this crash was very different from the previous ones.

… as he tried to get to his feet, he realised he couldn't move his legs.

"That's when I knew my life was gonna change forever."

Paul was helicoptered to hospital from the scene and rushed into surgery. It ended up lasting ten and a half hours.

He had a burst fracture in his T12 vertebra - one of the bones that makes up the spine (back bone) - causing the shattered vertebra to compress his spinal cord.

Doctors had to stabilise his spine and pick the bone fragments off his spinal cord. They also replaced his 12th vertebra with a titanium cage.

During those times, Paul only had one thing in mind: to be able to ride a bike again. But was he able to ride again?

Know more about his story over at BBC.

(Image Credit: BBC/ Red Bull Media House)

Between 1855 and 1861, during the Caste War of Yucatan, this paddle wheel steamboat, called La Unión, illegally captured and transported about 25 to 30 Maya monthly to Cuba.

"Each slave was sold to middlemen for 25 pesos, and they resold them in Havana for as much as 160 pesos, for men, and 120 pesos for women," INAH archaeologist Helena Barba Meinecke said in a press release.

The ship sunk on September 19, 1861 while en route to Cuba, proving that slavery continued despite having been abolished in Mexico in 1829 and a decree issued banning the forced extraction of Mayan people that same year.

Archaeologists discovered this ship in 2017 as a shipwreck, but it took three years before they confirmed that this was, in fact, a Mayan slave ship.

"For researchers ... the discovery is highly relevant," INAH said in the release. "Beyond the difficulty in identifying a wreck by name, it also speaks to an ominous past for Mexico that should be acknowledged and studied in terms of its context and time."

Learn more about the La Unión over at CNN.

(Image Credit: Mexican’s National Institute of Archaeology and History/ Reuters/ CNN)

It’s hard to keep control of your vehicle when it’s raining. This is why it is advised for us to slow down when it’s raining, to avoid accidents.

When this truck tried to park inside this garage, it seemed that the driver lost control of the big vehicle. But with an incredible amount of focus, godlike skill, great spatial awareness, and a little bit of luck, the truck driver manages to pull off a perfect drift. Let that sink in. A truck just pulled off the perfect drift. On a rainy day.

Watch the video at Reddit.

(Image Credit: u/ _asstronaut_/ Reddit)

Short answer: no.

Experts say that alcohol is just what it is: alcohol. And it doesn’t matter whether it’s tequila, beer, or champagne. But isn’t it true that the different types of alcohol have different effects? Experts have an explanation for that.

“Different types of drinks don’t have specific or consistent effects on behavior or mood,” says Nicole Lee, a psychologist and drug researcher at Curtin University in Australia. What can affect your response is the kind of experience you expect when you order a certain drink — which often turns out to be a self-fulfilling prophecy.

First, some basic facts: No matter your standard drink order, alcohol — or ethanol, chemically speaking — chips away at your inhibitions. “You have less control over your thinking and emotional centers when alcohol is on board,” Lee says. “If you are feeling a particular way, alcohol tends to amplify it.” When people regularly order a certain drink (say, wine or whiskey), they may erroneously assume that that drink explains the emotions they’re feeling.

More details about this over at Discover Magazine.

What are your thoughts about this one?

(Image Credit: VViktor/ Pixabay)

There may have been a lot of mistakes and blunders from both players in this chess game, but you don’t need a perfect chess game in order to tell a great story.

Adding some visual effects and memes, YouTuber Alphamaxnova1 (White) retells the endgame of this casual chess match in a humorous, but emotionally moving way.

The link to the full chess game here.

(Video Credit: Alphamaxnova1/ YouTube)

July, 26, 1714. The Løvendals Gallej, an 18-gun frigate, was sailing off Lindesnes (a municipality in Norway), flying the Dutch flag, when it came across a British-flagged ship. That ship was De Olbing Galley, a 28-gun frigate made available by the Royal Navy to Sweden.

As the two ships approached each other with caution, the Løvendals Gallej suddenly raised their true flag, and the other ship opened fire. The battle between the Løvendals Gallej, captained by Peter Jansen Wessel Tordenskjold, against De Olbing Galley, captained by Bactmann.

Both ships suffered heavy damage as they shot at each other. But the Løvendals suffered more than the De Olbing Galley, because of Wessel’s aggressiveness. His ship was already running out of ammo… but he still wanted to continue the duel. And so,

...Wessel had a boat lowered and sent with a white flag. The Englishman thought it was to negotiate the surrender but he was stunned when he heard the true proposal of the adversary—Wessel wanted a shipment of gunpowder and cannon balls to continue the battle.

Obviously the proposal was not accepted but they did toast together and exchange compliments. Then, given the battered state of the two ships, each one went their own way.

After this battle, Wessel was court-martialed upon the demand of Frederick IV, King of Denmark.

It was carried out in November [of the same year], and he was accused of revealing information to the enemy about his precarious situation and of putting a crown ship at risk by attacking a better-armed adversary. However, the audacious sailor was acquitted in less than a month when he successfully argued a section of the Danish naval code which mandated that fleeing enemy ships had to [be] attacked no matter the size.

And if he was already audacious in that battle, he was more audacious this time as he approached the king and even asked for a promotion, which he received, surprisingly.

Such is the life of Wessel. Full of confidence and audacity.

Learn more about this his life over at Amusing Planet.

(Image Credit: Wikimedia Commons)

In 1987, paleontologist Stan Sacrison discovered the first bones of this gigantic specimen. The said specimen stands 13 feet (4 meters) high at the hip, and it stretches 40 feet (12 meters) long from its snout to its tail. The creature, which was named Stan, after the paleontologist, was a Tyrannosaurus rex. Now, the dinosaur is for sale.

On October 6, Stan will be a headline act of Christie’s Evening Sale of 20th Century Art, where he’s expected to sell for at least US$6 to 8 million. There are rumblings that he could go for more than that however, meaning he might nab the crown for highest amount ever paid for a dinosaur fossil. That record is currently held by the T-Rex Sue, which was sold for $8.3 million back in 1997.

While there’s no telling where Stan might end up, it would be sad to lose such a spectacular scientific specimen to a private collector. Hopefully, he gets picked up by or donated to an institute or museum, so the world can continue to marvel at this ancient wonder.

Learn more about the dinosaur over at New Atlas.

(Image Credit: Christie’s/ New Atlas)

In this photo, Ashley’s 2-year-old daughter can be seen falling into the pavement after letting go of her mother's hand when she leaned away from her. But this wasn’t the only time she fell on this day, as the same happened to her again later that day.

Images via Awkward Family Photos