Haunted Houses have been making America scream for nearly 40 years, and now Haunted Houses have gone global. The haunted house industry is an American export.

100 percent made in America as haunt vendors design, build and install haunted houses all over the WORLD! Halloween is extremely popular within the US. However, it was not as popular worldwide.

Trick-or-treating is an American tradition, and for years it was the primary way most American’s celebrated Halloween, but many things have changed over the last twenty years. Halloween has become the second largest retail holiday grossing more than $8 billion. The industry of making people scream is now a WORLD WIDE industry. Today, you can find haunted houses in most countries. People of all nations pay top dollar to enter a haunted house…to be SCARED.

So what makes a haunted house one of the best and scariest in America 2012? There are several things a paying customer might look for in a haunted attraction prior to buying a ticket. There are so many established haunted houses, plus so many more that open new each year, and a lot of over the top (potentially false) advertisements promoting them all in every city across America.

At Hauntworld, we suggest attending every haunt possible (of course), but for those of you on a budget, typically you’ll want to steer clear from the brand new haunted houses. New haunts have yet to establish themselves and build up an arsenal of experience to make people scream.

Rather, we suggest you visit the established haunted houses, the ones with years of experience, the ones who spend tens of thousands of dollars every year to renovate for each season, and the ones committed to making their haunted houses the best scream factories in America.

We look for many things when evaluating a haunt for our America’s best list. So many haunted attractions are quite different from each other. Many haunted houses like The Beast in Kansas City, Missouri are inside industrial buildings, while others like Headless Horseman in New York are outdoor haunts with massive hayrides, corn mazes and more.

How do you compare a scream park haunted attraction and an indoor haunted house? In most cases, the indoor haunted house will have the best attention to detail, sets and special FX. However, the scream park style attractions will offer more variety, longer attractions and typically more bang for the buck.

There are scary haunted houses, and then there are THE SCARIEST haunted houses in America. What’s the difference? Some haunts just want to make you scream, but some haunts go all out with over-the-top efforts trying to be the biggest, the baddest and the scariest haunted houses on the planet. The haunts that have that WOW factor can make their guests scream, PLUS they provide horrific atmosphere creating realism in every scare.

They provide a Hollywood movie quality punch to the gut! Who wants to watch horror movies anymore when you can visit a haunted house and be right in the middle of the action? Below is our list of the best haunted attractions in America.

These haunts will put you on stage inside a horror movie atmosphere and basically make YOU the scream queen! Before visiting a haunted house, use Hauntworld.com to find the best haunted houses in America, as we boast the largest and most informative database for finding haunted houses. Shop by city, state and zip to find a haunted house near you or around the World.

So which haunted houses are the best and scariest haunted houses in America 2012? Which haunts can make you scream more than any other, more than the best horror movie? Below you’ll read about the longest haunted houses, the oldest haunted houses, and even about the best rides with a Halloween theme? We have it all for you once again in our annual Top 13 best haunted houses in America List. Get ready, turn out the lights, and get ready to scream!

#13 Nightmare on the Bayou in Houston, TX

Located in the shadow of downtown Houston, TX next to Houston’s oldest graveyard, Nightmare on the Bayou is the name people think of when searching “HAUNTED TEXAS.”  Nightmare on the Bayou is entering its 12th year in operation and has grown even bigger, even better, and even scarier with every passing year. 

Featuring newly designed scenes, Hollywood quality props, professional animatronics and dozens upon dozens of the most well-trained and highly supervised actors, CRAZED ACTORS, whose sole purpose is to scare you to death.  Nightmare on the Bayou boasts, “the only haunted house in Houston with REAL ghosts,” and with its location right next to the graveyard…I believe them! 

Ghost sightings are frequent from both customers and employees alike.  Additionally, Nightmare On The Bayou is one of the only haunted houses in America with a WORLD CLASS Halloween retail store on site for your ease and convenience.

#12 13th Floor Haunted House offering 3 locations: San Antonio, TX, Denver, CO and Phoenix, AZ

What is the terrible secret hidden within the 13th Floor?  Superstition? Conspiracy? Or something much, much worse?  As legend has foretold, The 13th Floor Haunted House provides a gut wrenching ride to untold nightmares STRAIGHT DOWN! 

The 13th Floor Haunted House is a franchise haunted attraction located in multiple locations.  These attractions are a true testament to high action, in-your-face premium production value among all haunted houses.  Each attraction offers a massive haunted event, one as big as 40,000 square feet and another as high as 3 floors up!  Through the wickedness of its massive Gothic cemetery and into its horrifically fantastic haunted hotel, 13th Floor customers get to experience a barrage of special effects, animatronic monsters and impeccably detailed sets. 

Add to that some of the most talented group of performers in the industry, and you’ve got a top notch, first rate haunted house that’s second to none.

#11 The Bates Motel in Philadelphia, PA

For more than 20 years, The Bates Motel Haunted Hayride at Arasapha Farm has been making Philadelphia SCREAM! 

This event is one of the biggest haunted house events in America featuring amazing props, digital FX, terrifying actors, professional makeup, pyrotechnics and multiple attractions in one location including a massive corn maze, an infamous hayride and a horrific haunted house. 

The Bates Motel has been featured on multiple television shows and ranked as high as THE BEST haunted house in the nation by multiple media outlets including Hauntworld.com.  The Bates Motel dominates the Philadelphia market as well as every surrounding area.  People travel from miles away just to attend this haunting event.

Please follow The Life on Twitter and Facebook.

I’ve decided to start a series called 100 Things You Should Know about People. As in: 100 things you should know if you are going to design an effective and persuasive website, web application or software application.

Or maybe just 100 things that everyone should know about humans!

The order that I’ll present these 100 things is going to be pretty random. So the fact that this first one is first doesn’t mean that it’s the most important ... just that it came to mind first.

See the mindblowing psychological facts >

Dr. Susan Weinschenk is the author of Neuro Web Design: What makes them click? and 100 Things Every Designer Needs To Know About People. All 47 slides are articles that have been republished from her blog, Whatmakesthemclick.net, with permission.

#1 — You Have “Inattention Blindness”

First let’s start with a little test for you to take. Watch the video below:

This is an example of what is called “inattention blindness” or “change blindness”. The idea is that people often miss large changes in their visual field. This has been shown in many experiments.

So what does this mean if you are designing a website or something on a computer screen? It means that you can’t assume that just because something is on the screen means that people see it. This is especially true when you refresh a screen and make one change on it. People may not realize they are even looking at a different screen. Remember, just because something happens in the visual field doesn’t mean that people are consciously aware of it.

Here is a change blindness experiment that was recently conducted:

Originally published on WhatMakesThemClick.net.

#2 — You READ FASTER With a longer Line Length But PREFER Shorter

Have you ever had to decide how wide a column of text you should use on a screen? Should you use a wide column with 100 characters per line? or a short column with 50 characters per line?

It turns out that the answer depends on whether you want people to read faster or whether you want them to like the page!

Research (see reference below) demonstrates that 100 characters per line is the optimal length for on-screen reading speed; but it’s not what people prefer. People read faster with longer line lengths (100 characters per line), but they prefer a short or medium line length (45 to 72 characters per line). In the example above from the New York Times Reader, the line length averages 39 characters per line.

The research also shows that people can read one single wide column faster than multiple columns, but they prefer multiple columns (like the New York Times Reader above).

So if you ask people which they prefer they will say multiple columns with short line lengths. Interestingly, if you ask them which they read faster, they will insist it is also the multiple columns with short line lengths, even though the data shows otherwise.

It’s a quandary: Do you give people what they prefer or go against their own preference and intuition, knowing that they will read faster if you use a longer line length and one column?

What would you do?

Originally published on WhatMakesThemClick.net.

#3 — You Can Only Remember 3 to 4 Things At A Time (The Magic Number 3 or 4)

7 +  -  2???

3 or 4???

Those of you who have been in the field of usability or user experience for a few years have probably heard the phrase “The Magic Number 7 Plus Or Minus 2″. This refers, actually, to what I would call an urban legend. Here’s the legend part:

Legend: “A guy named Miller did research and wrote a research paper showing that people can remember from 5 to 9 (7 plus or minus 2) things, and that people can process 7 plus or minus 2 pieces of information at a time. So you should only put 5 to 9 items on a menu, or have 5 to 9 tabs on a screen”.

Have you heard this? If you’ve been reading about usability for a while I’m sure you have. Well, it’s not quite accurate. Another guy named Baddeley questioned all this urban legend. Baddeley dug up Miller’s paper and discovered that it wasn’t a research paper, it was a talk that Miller gave at a professional meeting. And it was basically Miller thinking out loud about whether there is some kind of inherent limit to the amount of information that people can process at a time.

Baddeley conducted a long series of studies on human memory and information processing. And what he concluded is that the number is 3 to 4, not 5 to 9.

You can remember about 3-4 things (for about 20 seconds) and then they will disappear from memory unless you repeat them over and over. For example, let’s say you are driving in your car and talking on your cell phone (ok, you shouldn’t be doing that) and someone gives you a number to call. But you don’t have a pen handy, and anyway you are driving. So you try to memorize the number long enough to hang up from one call and dial the new number. What do you do? You repeat the number over and over (putting it back into short term memory each time, which buys you another 20 seconds). The interesting thing about phone numbers is that they are more than 3 or 4 numbers long. So they are hard to remember for more than 20 seconds.

712-569-4532

We also tend to chunk information into groups that have 3-4 items in them. So a phone number in the US is: 712-569-4532. Three chunks, with 3-4 items in each chunk. If you know the area code “by heart” (i.e., it’s stored in long term memory), then you don’t have to remember that, so one whole chunk went away. Phone numbers used to be easier to remember because you mainly called people in your area code, so you had the area code memorized (plus you didn’t even have to “dial” the area code at all). And then if you were calling people in your town each town had the same “exchange” — that is the 569 part of the phone number above. So all you had to remember was the last four numbers. No problem! I know I’m “dating” myself here by telling you how it used to be back in the old days. (I live in a small town in Wisconsin, and people here still give their number out as the last four digits only).

But that’s not all! Researchers working in the field of decision-making tell us that people can’t effectively choose between more than 3 to 4 items at a time.

So, what does all this mean? Can you really only have 4 items on a navigation bar? or 4 tabs on a screen, or 4 items on a product detail page at an e-commerce web site? No, not really. You can have more, as long as you group and chunk.

Here’s an example: At the Upton Tea site they have lots of tabs, but the tabs are not chunked into groups of 3 or 4.

So people will tend to do a partial scan and not even look at or read all the tabs. (I love their teas, by the way.. just wish they would do some work on the layout and emotional aspects of their site, but that’s probably another blog!).

I’ve covered more than 4 items in this blog post, so I’ll stop now! For those of you who like to read research here are some references:

• Baddeley, A. D. (1986). Working memory. New York: Oxford University Press.

• Baddeley, A. D. (1994). The magical number seven: Still magic after all these years? Psychological Review, 101, 353-356.

• Miller, G. A. (1956). The magical number seven plus or minus two: Some limits on our capacity for processing information. Psychological Review, 63, 81-9

Originally published on WhatMakesThemClick.net.

Please follow Science on Twitter and Facebook.

Movie lovers, and Hitchcock fans in particular, are about to get a fascinating double dose of behind-the-scenes dramatization. First up is "The Girl," which premiered on HBO on October 20, that tells the story of the relationship between Hitchcock (Toby Jones) and Tippi Hedren (Sienna Miller), the model selected to star in "The Birds" despite having no acting experience. Then, on November 1, "Hitchcock" will premiere at the AFI Film Festival – and is slated to open in select theaters by the end of the month. "Hitchcock" deals with the filming of "Psycho," focusing on the relationship between the director (Anthony Hopkins) and wife Alma Reville (Helen Mirren) while he is making one of the greatest horror films of all time. (And to answer your next three questions: Scarlett Johansson plays Janet Leigh, Jessica Biel plays Vera Miles, and James D’Arcy plays Anthony Perkins.)

Novels about writing are hard to read; we can’t think of any paintings about painting or songs about songwriting, but both of those seem like bad ideas. Film, though, is different, as movies about movie making can be both profound and fun. As a viewer, you’re free to ponder the layers: Text vs metatext; the film vs. the film-within-a-film. But you’re also free to ignore that and simply enjoy the opportunities for comedy and intrigue offered by a film set. A film set that is itself the set of a film. The film about the film.

Here are ten great movies (or at least noble attempts), according to The Credits, that peel back the skin of polished cinematic product and tell their stories within the guts of the process. Some are imagined accounts behind real movies; others are fiction from the title sequence to the credits. For the purposes of this list, we’ve left out – good as they are – biopics like "Chaplin," "Ed Wood," and "Boogie Nights" and concentrated on films that are about making a single film. Even so, the list of what might have been included – among them "King Kong," "Le Mepris," "The Player," and "Bowfinger" – runs well beyond ten entries. What can we say? Everything, even a Fellini movie, has to end sometime.

8 ½ (1963)

Director: Federico Fellini

Successful director Guido Anselmi (Marcello Mastroianni) is blocked. Everyone expects his latest work, a quasi-science fiction movie, to be yet another hit, but Guido can’t bring himself to care about it too much. He’s going through personal problems – the harem of sorts that has come to surround him (including a wife and a mistress) is rebelling. Guido is weary of his complex life, of having so many people depending on his every decision, yet it is through memories and imagined dialogues that he finds his way back, and ultimately rededicates himself to his career. A three-hour nonlinear autobiographical portrait of an apathetic, angst-ridden director? In anyone else’s hands, this would be a recipe for self-indulgent disaster, but when you’re Fellini – arguably the greatest director of all time – you can get away with it.

S.O.B. (1981)

Director: Blake Edwards

After a string of successes in the early and mid 1960s, including "Breakfast at Tiffany’s," "Days of Wine and Roses," and two Pink Panther movies, Edwards’ career hit the skids, beginning with the poorly-received "Darling Lili." "S.O.B." is a send-up of Edwards’ experiences making that film, which was beset by studio interference and recut before release without Edwards’ permission. In "S.O.B.," suicidal producer Felix Farmer (Richard Mulligan) tries to save a dog of a picture by turning it into an erotic musical in which Felix’s wife, the Julie Andrews-like Sally Miles (played by Edwards’ wife, Julie Andrews) will shatter her wholesome image by appearing topless. When this seemingly-terrible idea starts looking like it just might work, the studio begins to meddle. Felix dies in the fight to save his film, which ends up being highly successful. Sally, now widowed, wins an Oscar.

Barton Fink (1991)

Director: Joel Coen

This Coen Brothers film is more about writing movies than filming them – and it’s really more about not writing than writing. Protagonist Barton Fink (John Turturro) arrives in Hollywood after some success in the New York theater world. A studio executive gives him his first assignment: “A Wallace Beery wrestling picture.” Time goes by and Barton cannot get more than a couple lines into his script. Intrigue swirls; there’s a serial killer on the loose and Barton’s experience meeting a broken-down novelist (based on William Faulkner) is hardly inspiring. "Barton Fink" ends with a macabre flourish that might have been avoided if Barton had simply done the job he was hired for. As the studio man says, “Wallace Beery. Wrestling. What do you need, a road map?”

Please follow The Wire on Twitter and Facebook.

Forbes.com released its annual "Least Liked NFL players" list this week.

Collaborating with Nielsen, Forbes surveyed NFL fans to figure out which players they couldn't stand.

General consensus from Forbes:

"Who they don’t like: quarterbacks, cocky pass catchers and Dallas Cowboys."

Ndamukong Suh, defensive tackle for the Detroit Lions known for his dirty play, topped the list this year.

#5 Matt Leinart—QB Oakland Raiders—26% approval rating

#4 Randy Moss—WR San Francisco 49ers—24% approval rating

#3 Michael Vick—QB Philadelphia Eagles—23% approval rating

Please follow Sports Page on Twitter and Facebook.

Hurricane Sandy has yet to make landfall, but parts of the East Coast are already beginning to feel its effects. 

Mayor Michael Bloomberg has ordered a mandatory evacuation of low-lying "Zone A" and is telling everyone to stay indoors and off the beaches.  

Climate Adaptation's Michael Cote has pulled together a list of webcams from around New York City, New Jersey, Long Island and Virginia Beach so we can watch Hurricane Sandy unleash her fury on roads, buildings and trees from the safety of our own homes.  

Coney Island

WATCH THE LIVE VIDEO

Brooklyn Bridge

WATCH THE LIVE VIDEO

Statue of Liberty

WATCH THE LIVE VIDEO

Downtown Manhattan

WATCH THE LIVE VIDEO

Wall Street Bull

WATCH THE LIVE VIDEO 

Times Square

WATCH THE LIVE VIDEO

The Bronx

WATCH THE LIVE VIDEO

79th Street Boat Basin 

WATCH THE LIVE VIDEO

Long Island, Gilgo Beach

WATCH THE LIVE VIDEO

Jersey Shore, Seaside Heights

WATCH THE LIVE VIDEO

Virginia Beach

WATCH THE LIVE VIDEO

SEE ALSO: WORST-CASE SCENARIO: What To Expect From Hurricane Sandy's Wrath >

Please follow Science on Twitter and Facebook.

Join the conversation about this story »

Talk about bucket list locations, Machu Picchu is up there (literally). The sacred Inca city high in the Andes mountains of Peru isn't an easy place to visit, but thousands head there every day for a glimpse at the archaeological site. Having just returned ourselves, all this week we'll give you the low-down on how to get to this high place.

The train is blue. Unlike its European cousins, the cars are not painted with "Orient-Express" down the sides, but "Hiram Bingham" in gold lettering.

Click here to tour the train >

What would Hiram himself, explorer/Yale professor/politician, think of this train that makes traversing such forbidding terrain look so easy? Hiram Bingham discovered the site of Machu Picchu in 1911 and worked to uncover and preserve it for study and, yes, tourism. Even the switchback road up to the ruins from the town of Aguas Calientes and the Urubamba River is named the Hiram Bingham Highway (though it's hardly a 'highway').

But before we digress on some History Channel-ish tangents, back to the train! A one-way ticket averages $329 per person, in high contrast to the Vistadome which runs $76 and the Expedition at $62. There are a few dining cars and one bar car with a lounge and rear observation area, complete with an open-air platform. The locomotive is also blue, though a lighter shade that's the signature of its operator: PeruRail.

Although the more popular route for the Hiram Bingham is from Cusco (Poroy) to Machu Picchu (Aguas Calientes) to enjoy an indulgent brunch and take advantage of the observation car during the daytime, we had already taken the PeruRail Vistadome to reach Aguas Calientes and would instead depart by Hiram Bingham. The benefit of this? Relaxation in the booths, a multi-course dinner with wine, music and booze in the bar car, stars visible from the darkened open-air area (though it now directly faces the rear of the locomotive), and the simple drama of riding an Orient-Express train through the thick night. Imagine this over your amuse bouche: being out there in the pitch black mountains instead, watching this tiny strip of light slither back to civilization.

The romance of train travel hasn't perished, least of all here.

Since the Hiram Bingham is the last departure from Aguas Calientes to Poroy, it means more time for its passengers to spend both in the Machu Picchu ruins and in Aguas Calientes. Travelers on this late train can be among the last the roam Machu Picchu that day (the site closes just after 5pm with last admission at 4pm) without the worry of catching a bus down; there's a dedicated bus that departs after a 4pm tea time at the Orient-Express Sanctuary Lodge right at the gates, a perk also reserved for Hiram Bingham passengers. Both the return bus and tea time are included in the train ticket fare.

As we'd come up on the very first train of the day and would depart with the last [timetables], our time within Machu Picchu was more than enough to hike all over the place (we even doubled our trail a few times), geek out on the history and archaeology, pose for photos with the grass-chewing alpaca residents and then peace-out ahead of the rush, to chill with a Coca Pisco Sour at the bar within the Sanctuary Lodge until tea time.

Coming all this way, to the top of this mountain in the middle of the Incan hinterland, deserves at least a little quiet reflection time away from the interjections of tour guides and the aggravation of circumnavigating the tour groups (who have a nasty habit of easily an frequently clogging the thin stone alleys).

As is found with First Class seats on airplanes or suites on ocean liners, the luxury of the Hiram Bingham comes from its elevated levels of service and amenities, sure, but it really delivers with space and peace. On the Orient-Express, you board and are shown to a reserved table with high-back banquette seating. It's private, with polished wood and brass and mirror all around. If you travel solo as we did, that means a table for two set for one, blessedly eliminating the need to make awkward small talk after a long, tiring day. if you're the sort of traveler who however enjoys that, then the after-dinner drinks and party in the bar car is totally your scene.

When dinner is done and the Hiram Bingham slides into Poroy around 10pm, disembarking is as easy as stepping off the train and walking out to a waiting car (have your hotel arrange this since the area outside Poroy station is absolutely no place you want to be flagging a taxi). Back at your hotel (or hostel, sure) by 10:40 and you're out like a light.

Please follow Getting There on Twitter and Facebook.

A 12,000 square foot beautiful estate in Santa Barbara, Calif., is on sale for $28.9 million.

The home looks like it's out of a storybook and has breathtaking views. 

The house has eight bedrooms, four full bathrooms, and four half baths. 

Welcome to Chateau Sur La Mer in Santa Barbara.

The estate was inspired by the villages in the south of France.

The home sort of looks like a castle.

Please follow The Life on Twitter and Facebook.

Hurricane Sandy hasn't officially hit mainland yet, but flood pictures are preparing residents for the brewing storm.

After Frankenstorm, water damage professionals, such as sewer inspectors, will have to audit putrid tunnels to make sure there are no waste backup or plumbing problems. 

This job requires trekking through a lot of waste, but there are other dirty jobs out there. 

Host Mike Rowe from the Discovery Channel's Dirty Jobs joins horse castraters, skull cleaners, and other workers who "overcome fear, danger and sometimes stench and overall ickiness to accomplish their daily tasks." We've compiled the dirtiest ones here.

When researchers want to most accurately test a horse's pH level, these guys need to get the "freshest" manure sample which requires forcibly retrieving it from the animal.

Horse castrators remove the animal's testicles by grabbing the parts, making an incision, then removing the testicles with "the emasculator." This is done to make the horses calmer.

Sheep castrators actually pull the animals' testicles out with their teeth, because the parts are extremely "slippery" and this is the best way to grip them.

This is done while the sheep is fully awake.

Please follow Careers on Twitter and Facebook.

The Holmby Hills mansion where pop legend Michael Jackson died is about to sell to investment banker Steven Mayer, TMZ is reporting. 

The home is in escrow and closing this week. 

Sources told TMZ the home is selling for between $17 million and $20 million. It was originally listed for $23.9 million.

The home is currently completely empty, where as all of Jackson's things were auctioned off last December. 

Jackson passed away in the home in 2009. 

Welcome to Jackson's former home.

The home has lovely landscaping.

The home is modeled after a French Chateau, conceived by Richard Landry.

Please follow The Life on Twitter and Facebook.

In emergencies like the coming storm, your smartphone is like a Swiss army knife—a crucial, multipurpose survival tool.

Even if the power goes out, you may be able to get a wireless signal to connect ot the outside world.

With expected power outages and evacuations, you'll want to make sure your smartphone's battery will last as long as possible.

That way, you'll be able to get the latest news and stay in touch with loved ones.

Make sure you have emergency alerts turned on.

This is a new feature for iPhones running iOS 6, the latest version of Apple's mobile operating system. Availability also differs by carrier: Verizon seems to have turned it on, while AT&T hasn't.

If you have access, Start by heading to Settings, then Notifications. You should see an option for Government Alerts. Make sure that is turned on.

From what we can tell this feature will only work if your carrier has enabled it. AT&T has yet to activate it but from what we can tell Verizon iPhones should be able to take advantage.

Android users can access a similar feature by heading to Messages, hitting the Option button, and selecting settings.

Next, download a flashlight app but remember to use it sparingly.

Here are a few similarly named selections to choose from:

Flashlight 

Price: Free

Flashlight

Price: Free (This app uses the screen and LED flash in tandem, for maximum brightness, but that uses more battery)

Flashlight for iPhone, iPod, and iPad

Price: Free

Download TuneIn Radio, to stay up to date with alerts and information about the hurricane.

TuneIn Radio is a streaming radio app that takes advantage of offline streaming. TuneIn is a new way to listen to music, sports, and news. The app has over 70,000 radio stations and 2 million on-demand programs.

You can use TuneIn to stay up to date on everything about Hurricane Sandy.

Price: Free

Please follow SAI: Tools on Twitter and Facebook.

Microsoft took the wraps off Windows Phone 8, the new operating system that'll power devices like Nokia's Lumia 920 and HTC's Windows Phone 8x.

We have a full review of Windows Phone 8 right here.

Below, you'll find a screenshot walkthrough of all the important new features.

The lock screen now shows notifications like new messages and calendar events.

Welcome to the new home screen. These Live Tiles display real time information for each of your apps. Windows Phone 8 now lets you customize your home screen by adjusting the size of your Live Tiles. Let's take a closer look...

We extended the People app to take up the entire width of the screen. But what if we want to change it? Tap and hold the tile for more options...

Please follow SAI: Tools on Twitter and Facebook.

Tony Montana may have been living the American dream in Miami, but the real mansion that served as a backdrop for the 1983 movie "Scarface" is actually located in Santa Barbara, California.

It’s also available to rent for a cool $30,000 a month through Village Properties Realtors, according to Trulia.

The 10,000-square-foot Roman Revival mansion is located on a 10-acre property with a swimming pool, two fountains (both indoor and outdoor), tiled murals, and a guesthouse. It also has four bedrooms, a rooftop terrace, and staggering views of the Pacific Ocean.

The house is known locally as "El Fureidis," or "little paradise." It was designed by American architect Bertram Grosvenor Goodhue and built in 1906.

A bird's eye view of this gigantic property shows the scope of the 10-acre estate.

The palm trees and famous white fountain in the front make it easy to picture this mansion in Miami.

Here's another view of the famous fountain surrounded by four pools of water.

Please follow The Life on Twitter and Facebook.

We at BI Intelligence have built on our recent mobile video report to put together a comprehensive presentation on the mobile video revolution. 

Mobile video is quickly becoming a mass consumer phenomenon, much as digital photos were earlier in the smartphone adoption cycle.

In Mobile Video: The Small Screen Boom, we explore what is driving this massive mobile video growth, examine who watches mobile video and how they watch it, and look at the mobile video monetization opportunity. 

We've posted the deck here. We hope you enjoy it. 

BI Intelligence is a new research and analysis service focused on mobile computing and the Internet. Subscribers can download the entire deck as a PDF or PowerPoint, as well as any of the individual charts from the presentation. Please sign up for a free trial here.

Please follow SAI on Twitter and Facebook.

Halloween is creeping up, and that means we’re all looking for a little extra spookiness in our lives.

While there are some locales that just ooze terror, you might not be totally sure which destinations are the very scariest on Earth—that is, which cities are the most haunted and which towns have the darkest histories.

See the scary histories of 7 cities >

Not knowing this for sure can put a real damper on your Halloween trip planning.

But never fear! (Get it?) At Hopper, we ran the numbers to objectively pinpoint the scariest places in the world. With our guide in hand, you should have no trouble picking out a frightful site to get your horror on this October.

To learn about other fun travel destinations, hop on over to our blog!

Paris, France

You might not think of Paris as a scary city, but the City of Light has always had a dark side. With 22 cemeteries filled to the brim with famous and anonymous corpses alike, Paris has just as much in store for ghost-hunters as it does for lovers.

Many claim to have seen the ghost of Marie Antoinette wandering the halls of the Chateau de Versailles. Additionally, the violent end to the brief Paris Commune government in 1871 resulted in what is known as La Semaine Sanglante, or the Bloody Week. Somewhere between 10,000 and 50,000 Parisians were slaughtered in just a few days, and many more exiled from the city. If that doesn’t spell ghosts, we’re not sure what does.

Should you visit Paris around Halloween, don’t miss the Catacombs of Paris, a subterranean ossuary holding the remains of an astounding six million people. Unsurprisingly, many have reported ghostly sightings in the underground caverns.

Vienna, Austria

Another ornate European city not often associated with gore is Vienna. What began as a Roman military camp soon matured into a center of civilization and culture for Europe. A millennium-worth of inhabitants makes for high ghost potential!

An early target of the Barbarian invasions, there is also some evidence that Vienna suffered from a devastating fire around the beginning of the fifth century. The Napoleonic Wars brought even more violence to the area and the Battle of Wagram alone resulted in more than 20,000 casualties. Later, in the 1930s, Hitler’s army occupied and annexed Austria. The Allied bombings of the city in 1944 and 1945 also destroyed large portions of the city and killed many of its inhabitants.

If you manage to stop by Vienna this spooky season, check out the Ducal Crypt under the Stephansdom, which contains 78 receptacles filled with the bodies, hearts and viscera of several members of the Habsburg dynasty. Creepy!

Savannah, Georgia

Savannah has often been voted the most haunted city in the U.S. With a war-torn past and three historical cemeteries, this southern city has long been home to phantoms of all stripes. It’s no wonder, when you consider the city’s past. The Siege of Savannah in 1779 was a failed attempt by the joint French-American forces to overthrow British rule, and is considered to have been one of the bloodiest battles of the Revolutionary War, with 948 killed on the French-American side.

Savannah was also the site of the end of General Sherman’s famous March to the Sea (officially titled the Savannah Campaign) during the Civil War. The campaign devastated Georgia and the Confederacy, which surrendered to Sherman at Savannah. However, the city did manage to avoid being burned and ransacked, as most in Sherman’s path were.

This only adds to Savannah’s creepy old-world charm, with buildings that date back hundreds of years and are in nearly perfect condition. Later, Savannah was the site of various segregation conflicts. Six well-known haunted locations include: Mercer House, Marshall House, 17Hundred90, Wright Square, Pirate's House and Sorrel-Weed House.

Please follow The Life on Twitter and Facebook.

Scott Forstall, the Apple executive who was a former favorite of Steve Jobs but botched the launch of Siri and Maps, is out!

So who's in?

A host of executives who clashed with him and are now gobbling up the turf he built as Apple's mobile-software and -services czar.

WINNER: Craig Federighi now runs all of Apple's operating-system teams—OS X for Macs and iOS for iPhones and iPads.

WINNER: Eddy Cue already ran iTunes; now he runs all Apple online services, including Siri and Maps.

WINNER: Jony Ive now oversees software design as well as hardware.

Please follow SAI on Twitter and Facebook.

Google lifted the curtain off of three new devices today. They include a refreshed Nexus 7 tablet, a brand-new 10-inch tablet, and a powerful new smartphone.

Along with these new gadgets comes a new version of Android, Google's mobile operating system. It's called Android 4.2 Jelly Bean. The new software enhances the tablets: In particular, it makes it easier to share the largest model by supporting multiple user accounts. That's useful for families and workplaces.

Now that these are out, users may want to think twice about springing for an iPad mini, or any of Apple's other delicious new products.

Google is certainly turning up the heat.

We'll start with the Nexus 4.

One of the Nexus 4's newest software features is called Photo Sphere. It takes amazing 360-degree panoramas.

The Nexus 4 features a 4.7-inch screen with a 1280 x 768 resolution.

Please follow SAI: Tools on Twitter and Facebook.

Every year millions of visitors head to Disney World to see Mickey, take a trip through Epcot, and to get their photo taken outside Cinderella's beloved castle.

While families are there gathering characters' autographs and enjoying the rides, a look under the surface shows some of the hidden goings-on at Disney.

We bet you don't know about the ashy remains scattered throughout the parks, the second home it provides to felines, and, details of Disney's coveted Club 33.

There are haunted remains in the Haunted Mansion.

The Haunted Mansion ride at Disneyland is one of the scariest places in the park, but not for the reasons you’d expect.

In his 1994 book Mouse Tales, former Disney employee David Koenig tells the story of a tourist group that requested a little extra time on the ride so they could hold a quick memorial for a 7-year-old boy. Disney gave the family permission, but it turns out, the memorial was only half their plan. When the mourners were spotted sprinkling a powdery substance off their “doom buggies,” the Haunted Mansion was quickly shut down until all the remains could be cleaned up.

This wasn’t an isolated incident. Stealthy ash scatterings have occurred all over Disneyland. Not everyone tries to skirt the rules, though. Every year, several families ask for permission. According to one Disney spokesperson, the answer is always no.

Cats own the night at the Disneyland park.

Each night at Disneyland, after the sunburned families and exhausted cast members have made their way home, the park fills up again—this time, with hundreds of feral cats.

Park officials love the felines because they help control the mouse population. (After all, a park full of cartoon mice is more enticing than a park full of real ones.) But these cats aren’t a new addition to the Disney family. They first showed up at Disneyland shortly after it opened in 1955, and rather than spend time chasing them away, park officials decided to put the cats to work.

Today, there are plenty of benefits to being a Disney-employed mouser. When they’re not prowling the grounds, these corporate fat cats spend their days lounging at one of the park’s five permanent feeding stations. Of course, Disney also goes to great lengths to manage its feline population. Wranglers at the park work to spay and neuter adult cats, and any time kittens are found, they’re put up for adoption.

Employees had to monitor ride photos to make sure Splash Mountain didn't turn into "Flash Mountain."

Just before the final, five-story drop on Splash Mountain, Disney cameras take a snapshot of the riders to catch their facial expressions. The idea is to provide guests with a wholesome keepsake of the experience.

But in the late 1990s, the photographs took a turn for the obscene after exhibitionists started baring their breasts for the camera. Soon, Splash Mountain had gained a reputation as “Flash Mountain,” and websites featuring the topless photos began cropping up.

In its effort to curb this Tourists Gone Wild phenomenon, Disney began hiring employees to monitor the photos, training them to pull anything offensive before it got displayed on the big screen. Since then, the number of flashers has dwindled. In fact, the countermeasure was so effective that in May 2009, Disneyland decided that it didn’t need employees to monitor the photographs anymore, putting an end to what must have been one of the strangest jobs in the park—watching for topless riders.

Please follow The Wire on Twitter and Facebook.

Superstorm Sandy had a devastating impact on New York City.

(For coverage of storm damage from Jamaica to Canada, click here >)

At least 10 New Yorkers died, with more fatalities expected.

New Yorkers face 3-4 days without full power and 4-5 days without subways, according to Mayor Michael Bloomberg. LaGuardia Airport is extremely damaged and will remain closed at least another day, while JFK may open tomorrow.

Eighty homes were destroyed by fire in Breezy Point, Queens. Central Park is a mess; Stuyvesant Town is a mess. A construction crane collapsed from a Midtown building, and the front fell off a building in Chelsea.

And there's absolutely incredible flooding.

A lone pedestrian stand with his scooter near a message about superstorm Sandy in New York's Times Square, early Tuesday

A construction crane atop a $1.5 billion luxury high-rise in midtown Manhattan dangles precariously after collapsing in high winds Monday

Firefighters look up at the facade of a four-story building on 14th Street and 8th Avenue that collapsed onto the sidewalk Monday

Please follow Business Insider on Twitter and Facebook.

Pandora released an update for its streaming radio app yesterday.

The mobile radio service updated its Android and iPhone apps. This update comes just after Pandora announced it'll finally be coming to Windows Phones early next year.

The new Pandora helps the radio app to look much more polished and it feels easier to get around.

Besides under the hood features, Pandora also added a social aspect. Simply sign in with your Facebook and you can see what your friends are listening to and discover new music.

Overall, we're happy with Pandora's update, and recommend downloading it and seeing for yourself.

Available now in Apple's App Store. The Android version will be available within a couple of weeks.

The icon remains unchanged. Tap to open.

The opening screen seems pretty similar as well, but wait until you get inside.

Boom! All your stations are there and the app also sports a redesigned top banner and cleaner font, making the app look better already.

Please follow SAI: Tools on Twitter and Facebook.

Sandy was everything that we thought it might be and more, leaving a trail of devastation from Jamaica to Canada.

At least 69 people died in the Caribbean, plus another 33 deaths in the US—and both tallies are still rising.

As of Tuesday afternoon in the US over 8 million people are still without power. Early estimates of economic damage to the US alone are around $20 billion. Some of the worst damage was in NY, yielding incredible images of flooding and urban wreckage.

Here we've gathered pictures from the full course of the storm.

HAITI: On October 25 the storm was already causing widespread flooding

CUBA: Resident Antonio Garces tries to recover his belongings from his house destroyed by Hurricane Sandy in Aguacate

FLORIDA: Heavy winds late last week

Please follow Business Insider on Twitter and Facebook.