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12 signs you're about to be promoted at work

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A feeling of euphoria is in the air. You suddenly have new sense of confidence at work because you suspect that you're finally going to be recognized for your hard work. But until you get the great news, you really can't be sure — and you most certainly shouldn't start celebrating.

"However, there are some telltale signs that you may at long last be getting that coveted promotion — you just need to look for them," says Lynn Taylor, a national workplace expert and the author of "Tame Your Terrible Office Tyrant: How to Manage Childish Boss Behavior and Thrive in Your Job."

"But remember, false reads on promotions happen every day, so even if you think you see the signs, you'll want to remain as neutral as possible and stay focused on doing your best work."

Michael Kerr, an international business speaker and author of "The Humor Advantage," says the signs aren't always obvious, but people can usually tell if they are being groomed, or at least considered, for a promotion.

"Being self-aware is a critical skill for anyone to develop and so you should, ideally, always have a reasonably good sense as to how you are perceived by your colleagues and senior leaders," he says. "And talking about your career goals and potential career paths should be a conversation you have on a fairly regular basis with your boss."

Whether you're having those discussions or not, you'll still want to keep an eye out for the signs a promotion might be in your future. Here are 12 of them:

SEE ALSO: The No. 1 sign your coworkers secretly hate you

You're suddenly invited to meetings that you were previously excluded from.

This is a good sign, especially if you're invited to join meetings that involve senior management, managers from other departments, or key clients. "This obviously reflects a great deal of trust in your abilities," says Kerr.

Taylor agrees. "This is a great sign, especially if your advice is sought during these meetings and you're asked to lead future ones."



You've been asked to take on a special assignment or project with added responsibilities.

"It shows that you've earned the trust of at least your immediate leader and it's a great opportunity to grow and demonstrate new skills," says Kerr.



Your boss is being promoted.

When your boss moves up, it's a prime opportunity for you to advance — especially if you've worked closely with your boss and they've groomed you for the spot, says Taylor.



See the rest of the story at Business Insider

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Big, beautiful photos of the first Apple Store created by Apple's design boss Jony Ive (AAPL)

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apple store brussels 3

A new Apple Store opened over the weekend in Brussels. But this is not your typical Apple Store you'd find at the mall.

Located in the heart of Belgium, this new location was designed by Sir Jony Ive, Apple's design genius who ultimately controls how the company's bestselling hardware and software looks and feels.

Though Apple cofounder Steve Jobs is famously known for partially designing many of the Apple Stores, including their signature glass staircases, Jony Ive has never designed an Apple Store until now, believe it or not.

It's not the biggest Apple Store we've seen, but it definitely feels like Jony Ive's work: Simple, elegant, and friendly.

This is the new Apple Store in Brussels from the outside.



The walls in this new Apple Store are made of floor-to-ceiling glass panels that are 26-feet tall.



Some of these massive glass panels are curved.



See the rest of the story at Business Insider

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An architect made these gorgeous maps of New York City subway stations

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Every weekday, 5.6 million people take the New York subway. 

Navigating the system's 469 stations isn't an easy task, especially if you're a newbie. 

But architect Candy Chan has a plan for changing that — with a mapping project she calls Project Subway NYC

In 2010, Chan moved from Hong Kong ...



... to New York.



In Hong Kong, she grew up with helpful maps of subway stations, complete with numbered exits. "It's a really crazy system that helps people get to where they need to go," Chan says.



See the rest of the story at Business Insider

10 of the coolest concept cars revealed this year

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Buggatti

Car makers are getting more tech savvy lately. Or at least their concept cars are making them appear that way. 

Just last week at the International Motor Show in Frankfurt, manufacturers from Volkswagen to Mercedes-Benz showed off their futuristic concept cars.

The selection was impressive, with a mix of electric and hybrid cars. The vehicles were equipped with state-of-the-art features, which ranged from a holographic dashboard to solar powered roofs. Some of the concept cars could even be said to rival Tesla.

In no particular order, here are ten of the most impressive concept cars (not all are from the Frankfurt show) that have been revealed so far this year. 

Porsche's Concept Mission E can drive 310 miles with a full charge. Porsche aims to begin production in the next five years.

The basics: The car is powered by an advanced lithium-ion battery technology. A charging plate that can be stored in your garage allows the battery to automatically regain power, but it can also be charged at a conventional charging station or at home via a cable. In 15 minutes, the car can charge up to 80 percent, giving it a range of 250 miles.

How fast it goes: The car can go from zero to 62 miles per hour in 3.5 seconds, with a top speed of 150 miles per hour.

What else it offers: The car has four seats and four doors that open in a new way (as pictured above). It has cameras instead of exterior mirrors that captures your surroundings and displays what they see on the lower corner of the windshield. 

The car has eye-tracking technology that will detect where the driver is looking on the dashboard and open the corresponding instrument. The driver can then confirm the selection by pressing a button on the steering wheel.



The Torq is windowless but cameras provide a 360-degree view projected on screens.

The basics: The car, designed by Italian engineering and design company ED, does not require a driver, but the company's press release does not delve into how it would drive autonomously. ED hopes to create a self-driving racing car in the next 19 months.

How fast it goes: It's advertised as having 429 horsepower and 1328-feet torque. 

What else it offers: It is a fully electric car with four engines over each wheel.



Audi's e-tron quattro has a 95 kWh battery, allowing it to go 310 miles on a single charge. It'll enter production in 2018.

The basics: It can be charged with a DC or AC electrical current, and can fully charge in 50 minutes when hooked up to a DC current outputting 150 kW. The car can also charge wirelessly over a charging plate.

How fast it goes: Audi claims it can go from zero to 62.1 miles per hour in just 4.6 seconds, with a top speed of 130.5 miles per hour.

What else it offers: It has five doors and can sit up to four people. Rearview mirrors are replaced by cameras — the driver can see by looking at displays built into the front section of the doors. The car has a solar roof that can help power the car on sunny days, providing up to 320 watts of additional electric power.



See the rest of the story at Business Insider

NOW WATCH: Dial this secret number to see how good your iPhone signal really is

10 of the coolest concept cars revealed this year

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Buggatti

Car makers are getting more tech savvy lately. Or at least their concept cars are making them appear that way. 

Just last week at the International Motor Show in Frankfurt, manufacturers from Volkswagen to Mercedes-Benz showed off their futuristic concept cars.

The selection was impressive, with a mix of electric and hybrid cars. The vehicles were equipped with state-of-the-art features, which ranged from a holographic dashboard to solar powered roofs. Some of the concept cars could even be said to rival Tesla.

In no particular order, here are ten of the most impressive concept cars (not all are from the Frankfurt show) that have been revealed so far this year. 

Porsche's Concept Mission E can drive 310 miles with a full charge. Porche aims to begin production in the next five years.

The basics: The car is powered by an advanced lithium-ion battery technology. A charging plate that can be stored in your garage allows the battery to automatically regain power, but it can also be charged at a conventional charging station or at home via a cable. In 15 minutes, the car can charge up to 80 percent, giving it a range of 250 miles.

How fast it goes: The car can go from zero to 62 miles per hour in 3.5 seconds, with a top speed of 150 miles per hour.

What else it offers: The car has four seats and four doors that open in a new way (as pictured above). It has cameras instead of exterior mirrors that captures your surroundings and displays what they see on the lower corner of the windshield. 

The car has eye-tracking technology that will detect where the driver is looking on the dashboard and open the corresponding instrument. The driver can then confirm the selection by pressing a button on the steering wheel.



The Torq is windowless but cameras provide a 360-degree view projected on screens.

The basics: The car, designed by Italian engineering and design company ED, does not require a driver, but the company's press release does not delve into how it would drive autonomously. ED hopes to create a self-driving racing car in the next 19 months.

How fast it goes: It's advertised as having 429 horsepower and 1328-feet torque. 

What else it offers: It is a fully electric car with four engines over each wheel.



Audi's e-tron quattro has a 95 kWh battery, allowing it to go 310 miles on a single charge. It'll enter production in 2018.

The basics: It can be charged with a DC or AC electrical current, and can fully charge in 50 minutes when hooked up to a DC current outputting 150 kW. The car can also charge wirelessly over a charging plate.

How fast it goes: Audi claims it can go from zero to 62.1 miles per hour in just 4.6 seconds, with a top speed of 130.5 miles per hour.

What else it offers: It has five doors and can sit up to four people. Rearview mirrors are replaced by cameras — the driver can see by looking at displays built into the front section of the doors. The car has a solar roof that can help power the car on sunny days, providing up to 320 watts of additional electric power.



See the rest of the story at Business Insider

NOW WATCH: Dial this secret number to see how good your iPhone signal really is

Slash is the best iPhone keyboard you can download today — and it will completely change how you message your friends (AAPL)

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Slash is the best iPhone keyboard out today, and its killer feature is taking the pain out of jumping between your apps.

Research shows we spend 85% of the time in our phones buried in apps. And switching between these apps can be one of the most annoying things we deal with on mobile.

Slash’s innovation comes in the form of a blue forward slash that sits at the bottom of the keyboard. That slash is a magic button that can instantly give you access to a slew of app-based search engines baked into the keyboard itself.

IMG_2858.PNGHere’s an example.

If you have iMessage open with Slash installed and you type “/youtube taylor swift,” you're immediately presented with the top YouTube selections for Taylor Swift. Simply tap the one you want and you can send the link to a friend without ever leaving messenger. Simple.

This works not only with different mini-search options: like Spotify, Soundcloud, Giphy, Foursquare, Google Maps, or Google search — but also within any app that uses a keyboard (Twitter, for example).

The Slash team told Wired they think of their keyboard as a mobile-first search engine. Initially, Slash was going to be a messaging app, according to CEO Cem Kozinoglu. But Kozinoglu was worried that all the services and APIs he wanted to integrate, like Facebook and Google, would turn off the data stream if Slash got too popular.

It was a horrible proposition: your app would only work until it got popular.

Kozinoglu decided to make Slash a keyboard as a kind of “Trojan horse” to getting the functionality he wanted, he said to Wired. The keyboard is “pretty much the only piece of software that’s between your operating system and your apps,” he says.

That’s a place where Slash can make life whole lot easier for users. What Slash eventually hopes to do is become a Siri-like software that works even when you aren’t talking. It will guess what you are going to type and what functions you are going to need as soon as you start. If you are a Spotify user, for example, and start to type “have you hear that new song by…” it will already start pulling up the song. It will just know.

And right now, Slash is working to secure more partnerships, and voraciously absorbing every open API it can find.

So far, users and developers have been impressed. Adam Leibsohn, the COO of Giphy, wrote on Product Hunt that he’d tried a lot of custom keyboards, but that Slash’s integration for Giphy is the best he’d ever seen.

What’s next for Slash?

Kozinoglu says they are working on calendars and pictures to add to Slash’s already expansive list of features.

Here are some of the things you can already so with Slash:

When you type the "/," a little menu comes up.



You can search Giphy for the perfect GIF...



...and then simply hit "paste"...



See the rest of the story at Business Insider

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The 6 best things to do in Scotland

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Isle of Skye, ScotlandFrom whiskey tours to border abbeys, Scotland offers terrific experiences that should be on every traveler’s list.

Here are Fodor’s top picks for a memorable trip.

SEE ALSO: 23 pictures that will make you want to visit Scotland

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Prehistoric Monuments

Around Scotland, haunting structures like the Calanais Standing Stones on the Isle of Lewis provide an intriguing glimpse into the past. Sights are scattered across
the landscape, but Orkney claims a large concentration.

 



Seaside Towns

The country’s jagged coastline and many islands create scenic settings for towns such as Tobermory on the Isle of Mull, with its colorfully painted houses.



Isle of Skye

With the misty Cuillin Mountains and rocky shores, Skye has few rivals among the country’s islands for sheer loveliness. Links to Bonnie Prince Charlie add further allure.



See the rest of the story at Business Insider

Here are the world's sharpest young minds on how to test for Ebola, treat cancer, and solve the food crisis (GOOG)

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Shree Bose Google Science Fair's First ever grand prize winner

Google just hosted its fifth annual Science Fair and we couldn't believe the amount of talent demonstrated by the contest's teenage finalists.

The company even invited Ahmed Mohamed, the 14-year-old who was arrested after he brought a homemade clock to school, as a guest of honor. 

Meet the winners of this years competition, and some past champions too. 

SEE ALSO: Google has hired a bunch of engineers from Amazon's Lab126 for a new wearable tech initiative called 'Project Aura'

This year's grand prize winner came up with an easier way to diagnose Ebola.

Olivia Hallisey, a 16-year-old from Connecticut, took home Google Science Fair's top award last night for her work on a Ebola test that gives results in 30 minutes and doesn't require refrigeration (a prerequisite of the Ebola tests used today).

She used silk fibers to stabilize the chemicals, which she used to determine whether Ebola antibodies are present in the blood. She found that the test could still be effective even after sitting at room temperature for three weeks.

Hallisey received a $50,000 scholarship from Google as her prize.

Learn more about her project here.



A 15-year-old who came up with a genius way to transport vaccines won a prize, too.

Anurudh Ganesan won the Lego Education Builder Award for proposing a new way to transport vaccines during the critical "last leg" of their transportation journey.

When healthcare workers are transporting a vaccine to the person who needs it, they have to make sure it remains at a very consistent temperature to remain effective.

Unfortunately, they often have to travel long distances over rough terrain, making either ice packs or electricity untenable cooling solutions. 

So Ganesan came up with and tested a simple vapor-compression refrigeration system that requires only a little bit of power, which can easily be supplied by people or animals. 

As his prize, he'll get to visit Lego headquarters and a Lego exec will mentor him for six months. 

Learn more about his project here



So did Eliott Sarrey, who won the "Incubator Award" for his gardening robot.

Sarrey, a 14-year-old from France, won the prize for the 13-to 15-year-old age range for his Bot2Karot invention. Sarrey wanted to figure out a way to maintain a vegetable garden with limited time and mobility, so he created a rolling robot that could be controlled from a smartphone. 

Sarrey received $10,000 from Google and a yearlong mentorship to work on his project. Next, Sarrey wants to take this technology to the next level to automate a hen house.

Learn more about Bot2Karot here.



See the rest of the story at Business Insider

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Watch a mountain-biking champion ride across a rope between cliffs in the Alps

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Riding a bike along a ridge in the French Alps with deadly drops on both sides is a feat that requires skill, focus, balance, and guts. (Lots and lots of guts.)

Kenny Belaey, a record-setting world champion of multiple "bike trials" events, which put riders through an obstacle course, demonstrates that he has it all in his latest video for Red Bull, titled "Balance."

But the craziest thing in the video isn't the stunning scenery or Belaey's jumping from boulder to boulder. It's the fact that he also traverses a nearly 60-foot-long slackline — like a tightrope, but not as taut — on his bike over a 367-foot drop in between two cliffs.

Belaey's skill on the bike is incredible.

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The scenery is fantastic.

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And the actual crossing itself — reportedly the first time this has ever been done — is as dramatic as can be.

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See the rest of the story at Business Insider

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10 things we want to see in an Apple car

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apple carApple is planning to unveil its own electric vehicle by 2019, according to a Wall Street Journal report. But details about its secret car project dubbed “Titan” remain vague at best.

Sure, we know the company is hiring auto industry veterans and that it is experimenting with autonomous vehicles. But, we don’t know much about what technology will actually be included in the Apple car, nor do we know what the vehicle itself will look like.

However, we do know Apple will likely do what it does best when it enters a new market and take what competitors have done and make it exponentially better. Like Apple did with the smartphone, tablet, and laptop, the company could take the smart car to another level.

So we took a look at some of the most impressive cars on the market — as well as some automakers' concept cars — and pulled together a list of some of the features, functions, and design elements that would make the ideal Apple Car.

Let’s start with what Apple does best, design.

A sleek, aerodynamic design

There’s been no shortage of renderings from designers displaying their vision of an Apple car. But when it comes to what the car will actually look like, well, there’s not much to go on.

However, to make the electric vehicle as energy efficient as possible, the car will need have an aerodynamic design to reduce drag. 

While we don't know exactly what that looks like yet, entrants in a recent Apple concept design contest sponsored by Freelancer.com came up with some pretty good ideas. 

The one shown above was the winner and is described as having external high resolution LED screens front and back for head and taillights, as well as doors that open latterally. 



All-electric with a range of 400 to 500 miles with a single charge

By 2019, Apple will have a lot of competition in the electric car space.

Tesla’s CEO Elon Musk has said he will begin production of his company’s more affordable Tesla Model 3 by 2017, which is expected to have a range of about 250 miles on a single charge. And Audi’s e-tron quattro is expected to go into production in 2018 and will go as far as 310 miles with just one charge.

If Apple is going to compete with these companies and others who are making huge progress in battery life, then it will need to set the bar exceedingly high when it comes to mileage per charge.

While the company will no doubt have to at least match the competition, it would be ideal if it could greatly surpass the expectation and get somewhere between 400 to 500 miles with a single charge.



A super fast charge time

Of course it’s not enough for the company to just extend the range. It also needs to keep the charging time low.

Audi’s e-tron quattro car is said to fully charge in just 50 minutes. Porsche’s latest concept car the Mission E, which is expected to go into production in five years, is said to charge about 80 percent, or get a 250 miles range, in just 15 minutes.

Apple would do well to match this time or beat it.

It would also be impressive if Apple could integrate some sort of solar panels on the vehicle so that the car’s battery could get an extra boost when needed.



See the rest of the story at Business Insider

NOW WATCH: 4 ways to stay awake without caffeine

You probably wake up 8-11 times a night — plus 21 other discoveries from sleep-tracking apps

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woman sleeping bed insomnia

Why is it that you can go to be on time and wake up feeling exhausted?

Perhaps you are waking up more than you think you are.

For most of us, getting enough sleep is a problem. 

But thanks to fitness trackers like Fitbit, Jawbone UP, and sleeping-aid apps like Sleepio, we now have all sorts of data on how we sleep and how to improve our rest.

SEE ALSO: The Most Popular Times To Have Sex, And Other Fun Facts About Making Whoopee

Just because you fall asleep doesn't mean you stay asleep. Fitbit users tend to wake up 8-11 times per night, which averages out to everyone waking up 9.3 times per night!

Source: Fitbit



Women are slightly more (about 10%) likely to report sleep issues and to rate poorer-quality sleep than men.

Source Sleepio.

Read more.



However, women tend to get, on average, 20 more minutes of sleep than men. Women get 7-7.6 hours per night; men get 6.8-7.4 hours

Source: Fitbit



See the rest of the story at Business Insider

NOW WATCH: People were baffled by 50 sharks circling in shallow waters off the English coast

The UK's 10 friendliest companies to work for according to employees

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A trader dressed in a carnival costume laughs during early morning trading at the Frankfurt stock exchange, March 8, 2011.

People spend more than half their waking hours at work so it's important to try and have fun while you're there.

A big part of that can be the people, so anonymous employee review website Glassdoor has set out to find the friendliest workplaces in the UK.

The company has crunched through thousands of workplace reviews on its site to find mentions of friend, friendly, and friendship, then ranked 10 best employers in the UK.

Check them out below.

10. Sainsbury's

Sector: Supermarket.

Percentage of employees who talked about friendship: 16%.

Glassdoor review:“Colleagues are great, made some great friends.”



9. River Island

Sector: Fashion/retail.

Percentage of employees who talked about friendship: 17%.

Glassdoor review: “Staff were friendly. Great mix of people - variety of ages and backgrounds.”



8. Morrisons

Sector: Supermarket.

Percentage of employees who talked about friendship: 17%.

Glassdoor review: “There are some incredibly friendly and funny people who work with me who I now consider to be friends for life.”



See the rest of the story at Business Insider

NOW WATCH: Here are some incredible toys hedge fund boss Steve Cohen has bought with his billions

The 14 coolest things you can do in 'Metal Gear Solid 5'

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Games, at their heart, are sets of systems that work together.

In Super Mario games, for instance, there is a movement system, an enemy system, and a variety of other systems that interact with each other — through the player — to create a kind of symphony of systems.

A good symphony is seamless; you don't hear just the horn section, or just the percussion, but a fluid medley of sections all performing as one. 

"Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain," then, is a grand opus. A master work by a veteran game creator, Hideo Kojima, giving his all. It's also his final work in the series, and likely the last major entry in the "Metal Gear" franchise, before he's unceremoniously kicked out of the company he helped build up. It's with this context that "Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain" was released on September 1.

"Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain" might be the most detail-obsessed game I've ever played. This is why.

Find a wolf pup; raise a wolf pup; command an adult wolf.

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This little guy shows up on an early mission out in the wilds of 1980s Afghanistan. You choose whether or not he returns to your base. And why would you NOT choose to save a puppy from the wilderness and raise it?RAW Embed



But a puppy isn't the only animal you can save (in this game that has literally nothing to do with animals). You can start a full-on zoo!

All you have to do is track and tranquilize whichever animal you'd like to grab, like so:RAW Embed

Tracked! Now the tranquilizer:RAW Embed

And finally, an airlift out of the African savanna, care of the Fulton Extraction System (which is actually, unbelievably real):RAW Embed



After recovering animals, your home base ("Mother Base") gets a new area dedicated to housing the recovered beasts. (Keep in mind that Mother Base is an offshore oil rig in the Seychelles islands.)

Your base gets an area dedicated to herbivores:RAW Embed

As well as an area dedicated to carnivores:RAW Embed

There's an avian platform as well for all the birds you can capture. If you want to look up more information on any of the animals in the game, there's an encyclopedia built into the main menu.



See the rest of the story at Business Insider

NOW WATCH: 4 ways to stay awake without caffeine

This hilarious Vine star nails what it's like to be a teenage girl

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lele pons

Lele Pons' "journal" has been read almost seven billion times. 

Okay, not read. Watched.

The 19-year-old Vine sensation told Tech Insider that she considers her wildly popular Vine account to be a "journal" of her "daily experiences as a teenager."

She keeps her 9 million (and counting) fans entertained with six-second clips of her signature slapstick comedy.

She's so hilarious that we even decided to feature her as #15 on Tech Insider's "Social 50," a list of the best people on the internet right now. 

Check out 14 of the most hilarious Vines from Lele Pons. 

Even though she graduated last spring, Pons, 19, still posts school-themed Vines.

Vine Embed:
https://vine.co/v/OeTgLi1O1Jv/embed/simple
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She seems like she'd be a fun classmate.

Vine Embed:
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Height: 600px

 



Pons knows just how to capture totally relatable moments, like this Vine where she and a friend don't know any of the lyrics to a song.

Vine Embed:
https://vine.co/v/eia9l9mAdep/embed/simple
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See the rest of the story at Business Insider

NOW WATCH: We tried that viral 'skin a watermelon' party trick

This hilarious Vine star nails what it's like to be a teenage girl

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lele pons

Lele Pons' "journal" has been read almost seven billion times. 

Okay, not read. Watched.

The 19-year-old Vine sensation told Tech Insider that she considers her wildly popular Vine account to be a "journal" of her "daily experiences as a teenager."

She keeps her 9 million (and counting) fans entertained with six-second clips of her signature slapstick comedy.

She's so hilarious that we even decided to feature her as #15 on Tech Insider's "Social 50," a list of the best people on the internet right now. 

Check out 14 of the most hilarious Vines from Lele Pons. 

Even though she graduated last spring, Pons, 19, still posts school-themed Vines.

Vine Embed:
https://vine.co/v/OeTgLi1O1Jv/embed/simple
Width: 600px
Height: 600px

 



She seems like she'd be a fun classmate.

Vine Embed:
https://vine.co/v/OzPAdEZXvqD/embed/simple
Width: 600px
Height: 600px

 



Pons knows just how to capture totally relatable moments, like this Vine where she and a friend don't know any of the lyrics to a song.

Vine Embed:
https://vine.co/v/eia9l9mAdep/embed/simple
Width: 600px
Height: 600px

 



See the rest of the story at Business Insider

Disney predicted the future of transportation in 1958 and was eerily correct on a lot of things

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Disney transportationFrom electric cars to the Hyperloop, there’s a lot of innovation going on in transportation these days. But many of the engineering marvels we are just beginning to see were actually predicted a long time ago by none other than Walt Disney.

At the end of a 1958 Disneyland episode “Magic Highway USA,” Disney introduces a segment that he decribes as "a realistic look at the road ahead and what tomorrow's motorists can expect in the years to come.”

In the segment, the narrator describes futuristic concepts like tube travel and autonomous vehicles.

While the ideas probably sounded farfetched at the time, a lot of Disney’s predictions actually came true or are on their way to becoming a reality.

Here’s a look at some of the most bold predictions Disney presented — some that are here today and some that we may still see in the future. 

Disney forecast that dashboard panels featuring built-in safety controls and electronic operating devices would become commonplace.

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These panels would show you real-time traffic updates as well as other information like recommended speed.

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Of course navigation systems and other similar features exist in a lot cars today.



See the rest of the story at Business Insider

NOW WATCH: The Best Features Of Elon Musk's Hyperloop

The Hyperloop has 5 key advantages over today’s fastest trains

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HTT Hyperloop

Plans are currently in place to bring a Hyperloop and a high-speed bullet train to California.

Last week, Hyperloop Technologies — a Los Angeles-based startup developing Hyperloop technology — announced its plans to complete an operational test track next year. 

“Three years from now I believe that we will be designing and constructing the first two or three production Hyperloop systems in the world. Five years from now we will be moving goods and people,” Lloyd said during a CBS interview.  

Dirk Ahlborn, CEO of another California-based company Hyperloop Transportation Technologies (HTT), said the company will break ground in May of 2016 for a five-mile Hyperloop test track that will be located in Quay Valley outside of Los Angeles.

While plans are in place to complete a Hyperloop test track next year, a separate group of workers will begin construction a year from now on a high-speed bullet train connecting Los Angeles and Las Vegas.

Next September, China Railway International USA and XPressWest Enterprises will begin working on a 230-mile, high-speed rail, Bloomberg reported. It will be the first high-speed Chinese train in the United States.

Both forms of transportation will bring reprieve to travellers who must waste time stuck in traffic or opt for costly plane tickets to get between cities. But the Hyperloop is the better alternative transportation solution for several reasons. 

Here are five reasons the Hyperloop is better than the bullet train:

The Hyperloop is much, much faster

The Hyperloop, a mode of transportation that shoots pods filled with people through vaccum sealed tubes, reaches speeds of more than 500 miles per hour. That will take commuters from San Francisco to LA, or vice versa, in just 30 minutes.

The bullet train will reach 150 miles per hour, taking people between Los Angeles and Las Vegas in 80 minutes.

For reference, the drive between San Francisco and LA is six to eight hours, depending on traffic. The Hyperloop will cut that commute to just 30 minutes. The drive between LA and Las Vegas is four hours. The train's ability to make four hours into 80 minutes is impressive, but just not on the same scale as the Hyperloop.



The Hyperloop will be cheaper for travelers

People taking the Hyperloop from LA to San Francisco will only need to pay $30, bringing a roundtrip ticket to $60. The XPressWest website puts the average price of a roundtrip ticket between LA and Las Vegas at $89.

A plane ride from LA to Las Vegas ranges from $71 to $150, based on ticket prices at the time of writing, and lasts a little over an hour. If the bullet train can cost more and take longer than a typical plane ride, the only real incentive for taking the train would be to not deal with the hassle of security and lines (which is a good enough reason).

But the Hyperloop wins out either way, coming in far cheaper and much faster than the 80-minute plane ride (which costs $125 at the time of writing) between San Francisco and LA.

Breaking it down even further, just consider the distance. It's $60 for 766 total miles with the Hyperloop and $89 for 460 total miles with the bullet train.



The Hyperloop will arrive more frequently

Ahlborn envisions that a Hyperloop capsule will come every 30 seconds, Wired reported.

Craig Hodgetts, the architect and designer who led UCLA’s one-year program on developing the Hyperloop, also says Hyperloop pods are expected to arrive every 30 to 120 seconds.

The XPressWest bullet train will be built within or adjacent to California’s I-15 highway and run every 20 minutes during peak times, the website says. 



See the rest of the story at Business Insider

NOW WATCH: The Best Features Of Elon Musk's Hyperloop

NFL QUARTERBACK POWER RANKINGS: Where all 32 starters stand going into Week 3

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Ben Roethlisberger

The NFL is just two weeks old but Ben Roethlisberger, Tom Brady, and Derek Carr (yes, Derek Carr) are up and Andrew Luck and Peyton Manning are not.

Using two different advanced stats and the popularity of each quarterback in fantasy football, we came up with a formula to rank all 32 NFL starters after Week 2.

The formula uses Football Outsiders' DYAR metric, ESPN's total QBR metric, and the percentage of teams that own each quarterback in ESPN's Fantasy Football game. Think of the latter as a job approval rating, an indication of how fans think of the quarterback's potential moving forward.

Here is how the 32 starters are ranked so far.

 

1. Ben Roethlisberger, Pittsburgh Steelers

Team record: 1-1

DYAR rank: 3

QBR rank: 1

ESPN Fantasy Owned: 98.6%

One thing to know: It looks like Big Ben is going to get some extra playing time this year as the Steelers are the first team to get aggressive with the new extra-point rules



2. Tom Brady, New England Patriots

Team record: 2-0

DYAR rank: 1

QBR rank: 4

ESPN Fantasy Owned: 99.2%

One thing to know: Brady already has 754 yards passing and seven touchdowns. The Pats schedule doesn't get much tougher from here and Brady could be on his way to one of his best seasons yet.



3. Aaron Rodgers, Green Bay Packers

Team record: 2-0

DYAR rank: 4

QBR rank: 3

ESPN Fantasy Owned: 99.9%

One thing to know: Rodgers hasn't thrown an interception at home since 2012, a stretch that includes 17 games, 512 passes, and 41 touchdowns. The Packers are home again this week against the Chiefs. 



See the rest of the story at Business Insider

NOW WATCH: Take the IQ test that every NFL rookie has to take

16 reasons Android phones are better than iPhones

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Android vs Apple

Apple recently pushed out its latest software update and already sold out its supply of its new iPhone 6S

But while iPhones might be selling like hotcakes, there are still a bunch of reasons why Android phones are better. 

SEE ALSO: The amazing perks of working at Google

When you buy an iPhone, you're stuck with as much storage as you decided to buy at the get-go. Most Android phones, however, have a microSD card slot, so you can easily and cheaply buy more storage space.



If your battery starts sucking, you can often remove it and replace it with a new one. Can't do that with an iPhone. That being said, a lot of new Android phones like the Samsung Galaxy Note 6, Galaxy Note 5, and HTC One are made of metal and glass, which means their backs aren't removable.



A bunch of Android phones (including the HTC One, LG G3, and the Galaxy S5) can be used as remote controls, because they have infrared blasters on the top. iPhones do not.



See the rest of the story at Business Insider

10 never-before-seen creatures that will be in the next 'Star Wars' movie

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Sarco Plank Star Wars The Force Awakens

"Star Wars: The Force Awakens" is just a few months away, but there's still a lot we don't know about the movie.

Sure, we don't have an official plot synopsis, but we haven't even met all of the characters.

StarWars.com has quietly been adding more characters from the upcoming movie to its internal database.

They don't show up on the site unless you search for them or do a manual Google search. 

A bunch of eagle-eyed fans on Reddit have rounded up a bunch of them leading up to the release of "Star Wars: The Force Awakens" December 18.

Let’s take a look at everyone!

 

 

SEE ALSO: Facebook is showing off its virtual reality future with a tour of the new "Star Wars" planet

The Guavian Enforcers

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We wrote a little bit about the Guavian Enforcers when the new "Star Wars" merchandise came out early September. The character will be released as one of the Black Series collector's toys at an upcoming date. 

The description on the box reads as follows: 

“The security soldiers of the Guavian Gang wear high impact armor that makes them stand out among other deadly criminals.”

StarWars.com describes the character as part of a Guavian Death Gang.

 



Sarco Plank

Via StarWars.com:

"A scavenger and trader who scours frontier worlds for riches, Sarco Plank must wear a specialized mask that keeps his native atmosphere circulating through his alien lungs."



The character will also be getting his own toy which will be released at a later date.



See the rest of the story at Business Insider
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