Can Market Urbanism Revive U.S. Cities?

Many U.S. cities have declined for a half-century, due to ambitious government policies that backfired. Can a pro-growth ideology called Market Urbanism bring them back?

Fussy macaw cleans her lovely plumage in a sink

Even birds need spa treatments once in a while.

Iris, a 13-year-old hyacinth macaw, takes a shower in the sink to clean her feathers. She's a demure little bird, dipping her tiny claw under the tap to test the temperature, and fussing with the faucet to get just the right pressure.

Birds: They're just like us.

'Mortal Kombat X' trailer shows the descendants of our favorite characters

Leonard Nimoy's greatest hits: So much more than Spock

We're all crying over the Spock funeral scene in 'Khan'

Prepare for 'Game of Thrones' Season 5 with Forte Tenors' opera tribute Read more...

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Moscow march planned by Nemtsov will mourn him instead

With Russians reeling from the cold-blooded murder of opposition activist Boris Nemtsov, organizers planned a mourning demonstration on Sunday in place of a rally that Nemtsov had planned to lead.

See also: Boris Nemtsov's murder sends shockwaves through Russian opposition

Take a look at the developments in Moscow on Saturday:

The rally that Nemtsov had promoted before his death will now be a march to remember him

The city gave quick approval for the new gathering, in contrast to its usual slow and grudging permission for opposition rallies.

The mourning march on Sunday could serve to galvanize the beleaguered and marginalized opposition, or it could prove to be a brief catharsis after which emotions dissipate. Read more...

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3 Tech Skills That Help Kids Hack Real Life

The other day my niece and nephew came over to visit. They walked into the house and were drawn, almost magnetically, to the table where all of my gadgets were laid out. They caressed my phone. Fondled my digital camera. Gazed curiously at my noise-cancelling headphones. Petted my back-up battery. Admired my ThinkPad.

Leonard Nimoy's best moments as Spock on 'Star Trek'

The popularity of Star Trek's Mr. Spock is 100% thanks to Leonard Nimoy.

Nimoy made the role his own because he fully understood what it meant to play the alien — and seemingly emotionless — Vulcan character: Although he could often be coldly logical, his impenetrable exterior masked a tumult of feelings inside.

See also: Leonard Nimoy the photographer: Images from his other career

That duality came out in various ways, both subtle and fierce. In many cases, Nimoy would steal the scene, and connect with the audience in a revealing way.

Now that Nimoy is no longer with us, it's worth remembering the moments that made Spock the outstanding character he is. Read more...

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What Is Money And How Is It Created?

These should be two of the easiest questions to answer in economics; after all, money is the one thing that we all use in an economy—surely we know what it is, and where it comes from?

'Wicked Cool Toys' Challenge Big Is Better Toy-Maker Model

Wicked Cool Toys extends its bespoke approach to classic brands with a fresh Cabbage Patch Kids offering at New York Toy Fair.

Don't Feed or Shelter The Athletes: The Absurdity Of NCAA Amateurism In 2015

This week, ESPN reported that Baylor University walk-on Silas Nacita has been removed from the school's football roster for violating NCAA amateurism rules. The alleged violation: the formerly homeless Baylor University running back had purportedly accepted food and shelter from a mere acquaintance.

The Key to Winning a Pulitzer? Don't Take Time To Think!

Brett Stephens won a Pulitzer Prize for his foreign affairs column in the Wall Street Journal op-ed page. Only in his early 30s, Stephens can already boast of an enviable number of accomplishments. He has already been Chief Editor of the Jerusalem Post. And he is now Deputy Editor at the Wall Street Journal, one of the nation’s best newspapers. Pretty decent for someone who graduated college less than ten years ago.

Leonard Nimoy, Of 'Star Trek' Spock Fame, Dies At 83

Leonard Nimoy, who gained a fond international following for playing the role of Spock on Star Trek, has died in Los Angeles. He was 83 years old.

The $8.95 Million Malibu Modern Where Hollywood Loves To Film

Indiana may install 'baby boxes' for abandoned infants

A 2-foot-long metal box is Indiana's attempt to save newborn infants from dangerous abandonment and possible death

The proposed baby box is an answer to the state's problem of unwanted infants who are abandoned in the woods, creeks and dumpsters. Local officials want to put these boxes in local hospitals, fire stations, churches and nonprofits for parents to use as a safe, anonymous last resort.

Some information in this report was provided by The Associated Press.

Baby bat eats banana, makes us forget about rabies

Video captures woman yelling at flight attendant over candy bar

GoPro captures gnarly bro shredding on guitar while wakesurfing

America can't handle the cuteness of a 2-year-old singing National Anthem Read more...

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Hands On With The Panasonic TC-65CX850U 4K HDR TV

Introducing the (slightly) more affordable face of 4K HDR television

Why Technophiles Will (Or Won't) Buy An Apple Watch

Speculation about the Apple Watch is rampant, but do you want one? See why technophiles have plans to add it to their collections--or not.

Photographer captures the nutty lives of squirrels in snow

Vadim Trunov has an eye for wildlife that can make even the peskiest of squirrels seem lovable.

The Russian photographer uses high-speed lenses to capture wildlife subjects normally too challenging to photograph out in nature. His latest series captures the secret lives of squirrels as they search for nuts in snowy forest outside of Voronezh. The photos take a closer look at, as Trunov tells Mashable, "amusing, playful and curious little animals" that are often seen but rarely interacted with

See also: 11 Baby Animals So Cute You'll Squeeze Your Eyeballs Out

Trunov's previous subjects include snails balancing on mushrooms, ants dipping their legs in water and grasshoppers crawling on leaves. See more of his photographs on Trunov's website. Read more...

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Is Algae The Next Sustainable Biofuel?

By New Scientist, An Energy Realities Partner

Why Your Brain Thinks That Blue Dress Looks White

"What color is this dress?" It's the question that divided the Internet on Thursday — after a woman posted a photo of the dress on Tumblr earlier this week — and for such a black-and-white issue, there's a surprising amount of gray. To be clear, the dress is blue, with black stripes. But

Formula One's Most Valuable Teams 2014

British ISIS militant known as 'Jihadi John' named as Mohammed Emwazi

LONDON — The Islamic State (ISIS) militant known as "Jihadi John", who has appeared in several videos depicting the beheadings of Western hostages, has been named.

He's a British man from West London called Mohammed Emwazi, according to BBC reports.

See also: ISIS kidnaps dozens in separate attacks in Syria and Iraq

He was known to British security services but they chose not to disclose his name earlier for operation reasons.

Emwazi graduated from college with a degree in computer programming, according to friends that spoke to the Washington Post. He was a quiet man in his mid-20s who was raised in a middle-class part of London, the paper reports. Read more...

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The Story Continues.... Let's Don't Sugar-Coat the Real Issue

This morning my mailbox was bombarded with the news of a tentative agreement/settlement of the nine-month labor conflict between the Pacific Maritime Association (PMA) and the International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU). The people on the ground--my contacts in the 3PL, freight forwarding, and transportation industry--know that the labor strife is only a part of the larger story.

Syrian refugee children work to live in Lebanon

Of the more than 1 million Syrian refugees registered in Lebanon, more than half are children. Ongoing clashes between the Islamic State militant group and Syria's Kurdish Democratic Union Party have forced nearly 4 million Syrians to flee to other countries and caused over 7.5 million to flee their homes

See also: Unusual snowfall pounds Middle East, leaving refugees at risk

The refugee families bring their children but because many adults cannot find work themselves, the children are forced to work too, struggling to survive in poverty. Read more...

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How Floyd Mayweather and Justin Bieber bonded over an app

Floyd Mayweather Jr., the world's best boxer, pound-for-pound, finally announced his fight against Manny Pacquiao last week — something fans have been waiting on for years

But he dropped the news in a place most boxing observers may not have expected: On Shots, an app best known for being a place where teenagers can snap selfies to share with friends

Why he did that is clear, at least on a nominal surface level: Mayweather, as we've noted before, is an investor in Shots. But just how the world's top fighter ended up announcing the most anticipated bout of his career on a photo-sharing app that has yet to hit the mainstream is more complicated Read more...

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A Guide To The Financial Drawbacks Of Aging

There's a whole catalogue of requirements and humiliations that mark your older years. How do you deal with them?

Reese Witherspoon

Bill O'Reilly's crisis management strategy: Attack

When Bill O'Reilly once again used his Fox News show Monday night to defend himself from accusations that he embellished or even lied about his experience reporting from war zones, it seemed that the story might be dying down.

O'Reilly has been fending off criticism since Mother Jones published a report last week suggesting that his claims of reporting from a "war zone" during the 1982 Falklands War were exaggerated, since he had only covered riots in Buenos Aires, Argentina, far from the action.

On Monday night, O'Reilly showed some video of those riots; spoke with a former NBC journalist who defended him; and hosted a media columnist who had accused Mother Jones of going after O'Reilly as part of a hit job. Read more...

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10 Tips to Supercharge Your Savings

Biomass Plants Gaining Steam, But Do They Result in Less Carbon?

With the Obama administration hammering out its Clean Power Plan to reduce carbon emissions, the biomass industry is positioning itself as a leader in the renewable energy world. With that, a major U.S. utility has struck a deal with other mega-electricity consumers to provide all of their biomass-produced power.

How Do I Spot Medical Billing Errors?

Identifying medical billing errors is not an easy task. But when thousands of dollars are on the line, combing your bills for these mistakes is well worth the effort.

Lenovo hit with lawsuit over Superfish adware fiasco

That didn't take long.

Lenovo and Superfish were slapped with a proposed class-action lawsuit, filed late last week in federal court, according to reports

Plaintiff Jessica Bennett says she noticed "spam advertisements involving scantily clad women" on her Yoga 2 laptop. She assumed her computer had contracted some form of spyware, but eventually found out it was the adware Superfish, which was preinstalled on her machine, she claims. The lawsuit calls out Lenovo for "fraudulent" business practices and compromising user security and privacy for financial gain.

See also: How to get rid of Superfish adware on Lenovo computers Read more...

More about Malware, Cybersecurity, Lenovo, Tech, and Apps Software

Target undercuts Amazon on free shipping

Target is trying to hit Amazon where it hurts.

The retail chain announced Monday that customers can qualify for free shipping on all orders of $25 or more placed through Target's website "with virtually no exclusions," down from a $50 minimum previously.

See also: Amazon Echo: This is what a smart home should feel like

For about a decade, Amazon offered free shipping on orders of $25 and up. Then, in late 2013, the ecommerce company raised the minimum cost for free shipping to $35 amid continued calls from investors for the company to boost its bottom line

Those who sign up for Amazon Prime, the company's premium service which currently costs $99 a year, receive free two-day shipping on orders. Read more...

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What 'Shaft' Can Learn From 'The LEGO Movie'

Word dropped last week that New Line Cinema has procured the rights to the Shaft franchise and is indeed planning a reboot. The Wrap's Jeff Snyder is reporting that John Davis will be producing the film, which will be the third variation on the iconic blaxploitation character. He was of course first played by Richard Roundtree in three films in the 1970's before the mantle was handed to director John Singleton and star Samuel L. Jackson in 2000 in Paramount/Viacom Inc's quasi-sequel (since Roundtree reprised his role while Jackson played his nephew). Offhand, I would argue that this is another case of mistaking affection for an actor for interest in a character. Shaft wasn't a solid hit ($107m worldwide on a $46m budget) because audiences adored Shaft so much as it was a perfect case of Samuel L. Jackson playing the somewhat iconic character. But come what may, we are getting a Shaft reboot, which means that Hollywood needs to figure out what kind of Shaft they want. To that end, I would advise New Line Cinema to look towards The LEGO Movie.

How Companies Can Encourage Minority Populations To Get Into STEM Fields

Encouraging minority populations to pursue a career in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) at your business can help give your company a competitive advantage. Some businesses have even found that the diversification of its employees fosters innovation, creativity, and excellent performance.

How to blow off an iPhone call with a snarky text response

Sometimes you just have to tell it like it is.

If someone is all up in your iPhone's recent calls and you just really don't want to talk, the only way to stop the craziness is to be blunt with a custom text response.

See also: 5 Phone Charging Myths, Debunked

With two taps of your iPhone's screen, you can send a loud and clear SMS message that you aren't in the mood for a chat. Here's how.

Set up your custom response options.

Head to your Settings app, scroll down and tap "Phone." On the next screen, select "Respond with Text" for your options

You'll see Apple's vanilla default options in grayed-out text Read more...

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Does pacing back and forth actually help anxiety?

Maybe you're on a phone interview for the perfect job opportunity, or maybe your in-laws are due to show up any minute.

To deal with these everyday stresses and anxieties, we often subconsciously pace back and forth with no destination or clear goal in mind. But what causes pacing, and can it help ease our mood?

See also: The science behind brain farts

"Pacing is a behavioral signal to tell yourself that you're too overwhelmed," Sunna Jung, Ph.D., a psychologist specializing in anxiety and trauma, tells Mashable. "It could be a signal trying to teach you about something that's happening in your internal state, or it can be a form of distraction in the moment to calm yourself down." Read more...

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Full List: Winners Of The 2015 Oscar Awards

A light drizzle in Hollywood couldn’t dim the stars shining at the Oscars tonight. Here are all of winners at the 2015 Oscar Awards.

Everything was awesome about that 'Lego Movie' Oscar performance

The Lego Movie may have been seriously snubbed for Best Animated Picture, but its performance at the Oscars makes up for the lost recognition.

Tegan and Sara teamed up with the Lonely Island for a raucous version of "Everything Is Awesome," the film's Oscar-nominated song. Though short, the high-energy performance was absolutely packed with celebrity cameos (hi, Questlove!), dancing construction workers and, of course, Legos

Added bonus: Will Arnett appeared on-stage dressed as Batman, a nod to his role in the film.

See also: Oscars 2015: The complete winners list

Lego Movie director Philip Lord teased the performance just before Tegan and Sara took the stage on Sunday night Read more...

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Trappings Vs. Substance In Industrial Marketing

In the last 30 years, American manufacturers have focused on improving operations and they have done very well in terms of cost reduction, productivity, and internal efficiencies. You can’t read a manufacturing magazine without a plethora of articles on continuous improvement. The programs all have acronyms going back to 1980 such as MRP, MRPII, JIT, TQM, ISO, 6SIGMA, ERP, LEAN and many others. Some of these articles are written with the implicit assumption that that if you can execute these programs completely and do everything right, your company will grow.

So you want to build the next great mobile app?

Perhaps you have that next great idea — a mobile app itch you need to scratch. Well, don't we all? It's how you go about putting that idea into action that really matters

That's why Mashable sat down with mobile guru and founder of product development company Fueled, Rameet Chawla, and asked him what special ingredients are necessary for building a successful app. "What's going to determine success isn't the added polish, but what the app is doing," Chawla says. "If you aren't adding value to the user experience, then it won't end up being a popular app."

Rameet Chawla is a man of many apps. Fueled has helped develop apps for QuizUp, Afterlight, KeyMe, JackThreads and Barney's New York, to name a few. "Right now I have six screens," he says as he scrolls through his phone. "I typically start fresh when I buy a new phone, and I get a new phone every year. When I max out my screens, I create folders. I have no organizational structure. The apps are ordered in the order I downloaded them ... unless it's on my home screen. Home screen is specific." Read more...

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All the talk about the world's first 3D-printed selfie pancake is half-baked

When I heard about 3D-printed selfie pancakes, I thought we were one step closer to the dream of an all-selfie breakfast.

The UK research, design and development house Kinneir Dufort announced the foodie breakthrough earlier this week, following in the steps of the selfie toaster.

See also: This Is How You Make Selfie Toast

In a release, the company detailed a process that used digital imaging, face tracking and recognition software, a 3D printer filled with pancake batter and a griddle to print (and cook) a shape emulating the face of James Torbett, a senior electronic designer. We learned, in mouth-watering detail, how cooking instructions applied to a computer-guided 3D printer (batter was cooked longer for darker tones, and vice versa). The result, as seen above, was a pancake featuring a nearly perfect rendition of the original phototgraph. Or so it seemed. Read more...

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