Seventh-grader Serenity Marie and her mother Quyionah Wingfield recently launched Gen Connect Game, a platform to spark more family engagement through a curated list of questions and in-app activities. With the help of Carleton College’s Hack4Impact, a program of engineers that provide nonprofits with software, Wingfield and Serenity took what started as a brainstormed idea into an app that aims to tackle emotional isolation that comes with a loss in families for all generations. Gen Connect also comes with a specific Parent Guide, designed in tandem with Emory University, and provides tips on various topics
Tech executive and entrepreneur John Imah is one of those leading forces in business today. Imah joined Snapchat as the Global Head of Partnerships and Strategy in 2018, and as you can imagine – it’s a pretty busy job. Still, when he’s not at Snap, Imah works as a tech advisor to startups and some of our favorite A-list celebrities. His level of experience is beyond his years – he sold his first tech startup at age 15, and the age of 16, he sold his second company – a gaming firm
Facebook is planning to shut down its face-recognition system and delete faceprints of more than 1 billion people. At the present moment – more than a third of Facebook’s daily active users have opted to have their faces recognized by the social network’s system. That’s about 640 million people. But according to AP – it recently began scaling back its use of facial recognition after introducing it more than a decade ago. The move comes years after organizations and people of color complained about how problematic AI and facial recognition
Facebook parent Meta Platforms Inc. is pushing the boundaries of artificial intelligence robots and is reportedly launching touch sensitivity with two new sensors it has created. They include a high-resolution robot fingertip sensor called DIGIT and a thin and replaceable robotic “skin,” known as ReSkin. DIGIT was first released in 2020 as an open-source design; it uses a tiny camera pointed at the pads to produce a detailed image of the touched item. While Reskin can help AI robots to discern information such as an object’s texture, weight, temperature, and state. According
Singer-songwriter Mariah Carey has teamed up with cryptocurrency platform Gemini to inspire more women to get into investing. The app founded by Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss helps people buy, sell, and store their bitcoin and cryptocurrency. The star will be gifting fans $20 in the form of bitcoin when users sign up with the code “MARIAH.” A portion of the trades will be allocated toward Black Girls CODE, a nonprofit on a mission to train one million Black girls on coding to increase their involvement in the digital arena by 2040. “It’s
Beyonce has expanded her partnership with Peloton and is releasing another series today in the hope of inspiring HBCU students on their fitness journey. Peloton will also be donating their bikes to HBCU fitness facilities this fall as part of the collaboration. The 72-hour fitness session with Beyonce will include 17 classes spanning three days with content streaming globally from Peloton Studios in London and New York. For the first time, Peloton will include classes in three languages — English, German and Spanish — to be more inclusive. According to a press release
WhatsApp announced on Monday that it’s expanding its joinable calls feature to group chats – which means family members will be able to connect with more than one loved one at a time. Joinable calls, which were first introduced in July, allow users to join an ongoing group call after it has begun. But with this latest expansion, users can now call a WhatsApp group and join the call directly from a group chat window. Users will be able to join ongoing calls with your groups anytime, effortlessly, and directly from the chat view
B. Pagels-Minor was a program manager at Netflix before she was fired and accused of leaking internal numbers about Dave Chappelle’s show ‘The Closer’ to the media. Chappelle’s latest stand-up comedy special, which was released on Oct. 5, has been widely criticized for including anti-trans jokes and for “attacking” the LGBTQ community. But Pagels-Minor took it upon herself to help organize a protest to provoke change against attacks on the community. She claimed that by 4 pm on Oct. 14th a walkout protest was announced and around 7 p.m –
Cash App has launched Cash App Studios, which allows the mobile payment service to invest in creators’ projects. Creatives include artists, designers, directors, and musicians. In an official statement, Brian Grassadonia, lead at Cash App, said: “We’ve long upheld the importance of artistic expression at Cash App. With the introduction of Cash App Studios, we’ll continue to support the artist’s freedom, both financially and creatively. “In keeping with our guiding principle of economic empowerment, we are excited to support emerging artists who are limitless in their vision with this new program.” Artists
Telkom has reportedly dropped Netflix Inc – meaning the app will no longer be available on the South African phone and internet company’s set-top box from October. Content Executive Wanda Mkhize announced that a deal between the parties had ended and would not be renewed. But other content partnerships will be announced in due course; she told Bloomberg. It’s not clear whether Netflix has plans to build a different route to consumers and existing subscribers in South Africa now that its relationship with Telkom has ended. The media has been
