New York, United States -Legendary singer Billie Holiday will return to the New York stage posthumously this year as the Apollo Theater launches hologram performances.
The Apollo, the iconic cradle of jazz located in Harlem, announced it would be the first theater in the United States to feature regular programming by hologram.
The first performance will take place later in the year -- a show by Holiday, one of the greatest influences on generations of jazz and pop singers, who died destitute in 1959.
"The possibilities inherent in this initiative are very exciting, allowing us the ability to show the enduring impact and relevance of artists across time periods and geographic locations," said Jonelle Procope, president and CEO of the Apollo Theater.
Procope said that the Holiday show, made in consultation with her estate, and subsequent performances would also accommodate the growing number of daytime tourists looking to visit the famous theater.
Holiday, who would have turned 100 last April, sang frequently at the Apollo -- one of the few racially integrated theaters at the time -- including an early performance of the seminal protest song "Strange Fruit" about lynchings of African Americans in the US South.
"To be able to bring back epic artists on the historic stage that gave them their debuts is mind-boggling," said Alki David, the Greek-British entrepreneur behind Hologram USA, the company that is partnering with the Apollo.
Holograms record light fields, rather than standard camera images of objects, allowing a three-dimensional presentation.
As the technology has become increasingly sophisticated, holograms have been in growing demand in the concert industry.
The hologram craze took off in 2012 when the Coachella festival in California successfully "resurrected" slain rapper Tupac Shakur to perform alongside hip-hop stars Snoop Dogg and Dr. Dre.
Other notable hologram projects have included a Las Vegas show by late showman Liberace and a brief concert by rapper Chief Keef that was beamed in after he was prevented from playing in Chicago due to arrest warrants.
But holograms are not without critics who have questioned the tastefulness and artistic merit.
The Grateful Dead considered but ruled out bringing back late guitarist Jerry Garcia by hologram when the hippie-era legends played a series of farewell shows in July.
Washington, United States -Researchers fitted a man who has been paralyzed for more than a decade with an experimental prosthetic hand that lets him "feel" sensations, the US military's futuristic development department said.
Scientists wired electrodes into the 28-year-old patient's sensory cortex, which is the part of the brain that identifies tactile sensations, enabling him to perceive a basic sense of touch.
In the first series of tests, researchers gently touched each finger of the prosthetic hand while the man was wearing a blindfold.
He was able to state with nearly 100-percent accuracy which finger was being touched, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, better known as DARPA, said in a statement Friday.
"At one point, instead of pressing one finger, the team decided to press two without telling him," said Justin Sanchez, who heads DARPA's Revolutionizing Prosthetics program.
"He responded in jest, asking whether somebody was trying to play a trick on him. That is when we knew that the feelings he was perceiving through the robotic hand were near-natural."
Researchers also sent wires from the man's motor cortex to the hand, so he was able to control its movements with his thoughts. The mechanical hand was developed by the Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) at Johns Hopkins University.
It's the sort of technology that until recently was imaginable only in science fiction -- like the scene from the 1980 classic movie "The Empire Strikes Back," where Luke Skywalker gets a prosthetic hand after losing his own in a lightsaber dual with Darth Vader.
But DARPA says new advances made possible by neural technologies it is developing point to a future "in which people living with paralyzed or missing limbs will not only be able to manipulate objects by sending signals from their brain to robotic devices, but also be able to sense precisely what those devices are touching."
DARPA did not release the identity of the volunteer in this study, and said only that he had suffered a spinal cord injury.
"By wiring a sense of touch from a mechanical hand directly into the brain, this work shows the potential for seamless bio-technological restoration of near-natural function," Sanchez said.
The study has been submitted for peer review and eventual publication in a science journal.
New York, United States -Madeline Stuart is a beautiful, bubbly red head who at 18 is already a professional model with a handbag named after her.
What is remarkable is that she has Down's Syndrome.
Born and bred in Australia, she flew 28 hours across the world to take part in New York fashion week, where on Sunday she will tread the runway twice -- in couture and resort wear.
She is not the first Down's model to walk in New York but her mother celebrates her inclusion as a sign that the stiff, intimidating world of fashion is slowly opening up to more diverse women.
"Madeline is very excited," her mother Rosanne Stuart told AFP backstage at rehearsals for Sunday's show at Vanderbilt Hall, Grand Central Station -- one of Manhattan's best-loved landmarks.
"I think it's amazing that she's been given this opportunity. It's a fantastic platform for us to get our beliefs across on inclusion and disability."
The show is organized by fashion producers FTL MODA with the Christopher and Dana Reeve Foundation and Models of Diversity, a British group that campaigns for diversity in the fashion industry.
Stuart speaks for Madeline, saying it is difficult for strangers to understand her speech. Backstage, Madeline was reveling in the attention.
"She likes to be in the spotlight and she likes people to notice her and she thinks she's pretty cool," said Stuart.
- More open now -
Madeline's career took off when Stuart uploaded photographs of her in May to Facebook, where they quickly went viral.
Within a week, she had 20,000 followers. Today, her Facebook page has been liked by nearly half a million people.
A company called EverMaya has named a handbag after her and donates its sales to the National Down Syndrome society.
She has become the face of cosmetics company Glossigirl and FTL MODA contacted them a month ago, inviting them to New York fashion week.
The Stuarts head next to the West Coat, where Madeline will collect a prize as model of the year.
There are further plans to visit Sweden and even Russia, and she has been nominated for awards in Australia.
It's a far cry from the discrimination Rosanne recalls when Madeline was born, being abused in the park and the isolation of living with disability.
"I think people are a lot more open now," she said. "Social media has brought everything to the forefront. Things aren't hidden anymore."
If just one parent of a Down's child believes their kids can have a great life as a result of Madeline's example, she will feel happy, Stuart said.
- Bionic model -
Another model walking in the show is Rebekah Marine, 28, a car saleswoman from New Jersey. Born without a right arm, she is proud to be called "bionic model."
"It gives what I'm doing more of an edge, so I think it's pretty cool. A lot of kids think I'm like a superhero now," she joked.
Marine is a stunning brunette -- the epitome of health with sun-kissed skin and an incredible smile, but not the statuesque, rake-thin, racehorse-limbed model favored by many in the high fashion world.
Despite her disability, she dreamed of being a model as a child, and went to auditions and photo shoots with her mother but was always turned away.
"I think the fashion industry has come a long way," she told AFP.
"I think a lot of brands are very hesitant to include models that aren't necessarily five nine, skinny, blue eyed, blonde.
"So it's a challenge but we're definitely making progress and it's so awesome to be a part of that."
Marine is a motivational speaker and a spokeswoman for her new i-limb -- an incredible state-of-the-art prosthesis.
Its sensors allow her to manipulate its fingers and thumb, allowing her to do little things that others take for granted, such as holding a pot of yogurt or cutting meat using a knife and a fork.
"If I died tonight, I'd be like the happiest person in the world," Marine said.
"I think I've made an impact on people and that's all I could really ask for, is to just change people's lives."
Paris, France -Moronic rabbits will soon invade Malaysia as French video game developer Ubisoft unveiled plans to open its first theme park featuring innovative rides from its biggest franchises like Rabbids, Assassin’s Creed and Just Dance.
Ubisoft said it aims to have the 10,000 square metre (108,000 square feet) park in the centre of Kuala Lumpur ready in 2020 working with its local partner, Malaysia theme park developer RGS which is also set next year to open a park together with Dreamworks animation studios.
"Together we are creating a place where every guest is a player, every ride is a playground, every visit is a game," Jean de Rivieres, senior vice president at Ubisoft Motion Pictures, said in a statement.
RSG Chairman Ramelle Ramli said the company "is committed to redefining family fun, and video games have taken an increasingly central role in entertainment for all ages."
Ubisoft has in recent years sought to diversify itself from video games, including merchandising the moronic rabbits as well as a TV show.
The rabbits have already invaded France's Futuroscope theme park with the Rabbids Dark Ride.
mch/rl/boc
© 1994-2015 Agence France-Presse
Moscow, Russia -Two five-year-old Russian boys used spades to dig their way out of their kindergarten and set off on a mission to buy a Jaguar sports car, Komsomolskaya Pravda daily reported .
The two boys disappeared as their group took part in a supervised walk in the grounds of the kindergarten in the city of Magnitogorsk in the Urals region, the tabloid reported.
Chelyabinsk regional interior ministry confirmed the boys' escape from kindergarten to AFP.
"We don't have any details yet, we can only confirm the fact itself," a spokesman told AFP, adding that the incident took place several days ago.
After reaching freedom, the boys walked two kilometres to a car showroom selling luxury cars.
A female driver noticed the unaccompanied children and asked them what they were doing. They told her they had come from their kindergarten to buy a Jaguar but did not have any money.
She put them in her car and drove them to a police station.
The boys had prepared their escape for several days, digging a hole under a fence using spades from the sand pit, Komsomolskaya Pravda reported, citing kindergarten staff.
The kindergarten only noticed the boys' absence after half an hour.
Local educational authorities responded by firing the supervisor in charge at the time and giving a warning to the acting head.
"This is considered a very serious violation," the head of the pre-school department of Magnitogorsk, Olga Denisenko, told Komsomolskaya Pravda. She could not be immediately reached for comment.
The children's parents did not submit any complaint against the kindergarten.
Washington, United States US telecom giant Verizon announced it would start field testing of the superfast fifth generation of wireless technology or 5G, in 2016.
The announcement aims to accelerate the deployment of the new wireless system that could unleash innovation and new services such as driverless cars and remote surgery.
Global carriers have been in talks to deploy 5G wireless by 2020, but Verizon said its "aggressive roadmap" is "accelerating the expected rate of innovation."
"5G is no longer a dream of the distant future," said Roger Gurnani, chief information and technology architect for Verizon.
"We feel a tremendous sense of urgency to push forward on 5G and mobilize the ecosystem by collaborating with industry leaders and developers to usher in a new generation of innovation."
Verizon's statement did not include a timetable for 5G rollout but Gurnani told the news website CNET he expects "some level of commercial deployment" by 2017.
Verizon said it was working with partners including Alcatel-Lucent, Cisco, Ericsson, Nokia, Qualcomm and Samsung, establishing working teams for testing the technology.
5G was a key topic for participants at this year's Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, a mega-trade show for telecom innovations.
The new 5G technology is expected to deliver data speeds up to 1,000 times faster than the current 4G systems enabling fast transfer of data from Internet-connected devices from fitness bands to self-driving cars.
Verizon launched the first US network using 4G long-term evolution (LTE) which is a standard being adopted in many countries for wireless phones, tablets and other devices.
To fulfil the 5G dream, manufacturers must build infrastructure that can carry mobile phone signals powerful and quick enough to unfailingly support split-second activities, such as surgical operations or automatic traffic movement.
The GSMA, the world mobile operators' consortium that organizes the Barcelona gathering, said in a report in December that with ultra-fast 5G, "an operation could be performed by a robot that is remotely controlled by a surgeon on the other side of the world."
Tech specialists at the Boston Consulting Group estimated in a report that mobile companies would have to spend $4 trillion (3.6 trillion euros) on research and investments by 2020 to develop 5G.
New York, United States -Eating too much salt can cause high blood pressure, heart disease and strokes. And now New Yorkers will get that warning loud and clear when they browse a restaurant menu.
New York on Wednesday became the first city in the United States to demand that chain restaurants put salt warnings on their menus in a measure unanimously approved by the health board.
It is the latest in a long line of public health measures, including a pioneering ban on smoking since adopted across the world designed to encourage healthier behavior.
"High sodium intake is dangerous. It is linked to increased blood pressure and risk of heart disease and stroke," said the city health department.
"With a simple menu icon and statement to alert restaurant customers which items have exceedingly high sodium, New Yorkers will have easily accessible information that can affect their health," it added.
New York Mayor Bill de Blasio has committed to reducing premature mortality by 25 percent by 2040. Last year, New York raised to 21 the minimum age at which a person can buy cigarettes.
Paris, France-Super Mario, the hyperactive little plumber who has become one of the best-known characters in video game history, celebrates his 30th birthday and Japanese giant Nintendo is marking the event with the release of a creative new format.
With his blue overalls, red cap and fulsome moustache, Mario is instantly recognisable, a rare quality in the games market, matched only by a handful of characters such as Lara Croft, Sonic the Hedgehog and Pac-Man.
So beloved is Mario that Nintendo has sold more than 310 million units featuring him since he first hit the screens under his own name in 1985, the year that Ronald Reagan began a second term as US president and the Live Aid concerts for the Ethiopian famine relief took place.
"Mario now has a status in popular culture equal to Mickey Mouse," Florent Gorges, the French author of a book on Nintendo's history, told AFP.
"He is likely to be around for some time yet because we notice that it's often parents who introduce him to their children."
Even before the first "Super Mario Bros" game was released on September 13, 1985, in Japan on the Famicom console, the character had already made an appearance in the Nintendo arcade game "Donkey Kong", but under the name Jumpman.
The Mario moniker came from the landlord of the warehouse where the US arm of Nintendo was based, whose physical appearance made the programmers think of a video game character.
Mario's creator, game designer Shigeru Miyamoto, said: "I had it in mind to make him an Italian when I was drawing the character, so I decided to officially call him Mario."
- Shaped by limited hardware -
Mario's plain appearance is attributed to the limitations of the hardware at the time, with a limited number of pixels and restricted range of colours -- but it has possibly helped increase his longevity.
"I drew him with a big nose and a moustache so that players could recognise his face. (At first) Mario wore a white shirt and red overalls so his arm movements would be clearly visible," Miyamoto said in an interview released by Nintendo.
There was a simple explanation for his cap too -- the designers initially lacked the technology to make his hair move.
In his best-known adventures, Mario comes to the rescue of Princess Peach, but our hero has also been inserted into formats featuring football, golf or karting.
The games have often been accompanied by technological advances, such as the fully three-dimensional format introduced by "Super Mario 64" in 1996.
To mark the three-decade milestone, Nintendo is releasing "Super Mario Maker" on the WiiU console, which allows players to create their own worlds for Mario, or use those created by other players and shared through the Internet.
And for adults still nostalgic for the Mario of their youth, the new game allows players a choice of four styles of graphics, ranging from those in 1985's "Super Mario Bros" to "New Super Mario Bros U" released in 2012.
© 1994-2015 Agence France-Presse
Washington, United States The market for wearable tech, led by Apple Watch and a range of connected fitness gadgets, is exploding, a survey showed.
The report by research firm IDC said global wearable device shipments will reach 76.1 million units in 2015, up 163.6 percent from 2014.
By 2019, worldwide shipments will reach 173.4 million units, a growth rate of nearly 23 percent over the next five years.
The biggest growth segment in this category is "smart wearables," which includes watches and devices with more capabilities than "basic" wearables such as fitness bands.
"Smart wearables only account for about a third of the total market today while basic wearables, led by fitness trackers, account for the rest," said IDC analyst Jitesh Ubrani.
But Urbani said smart wearables are on track to surpass the less functional basic wearable category in 2018.
"Smart wearables will quickly move from a smartphone accessory primarily focused on notifications to a more advanced wearable computer capable of doing more processing on its own," he said in a statement.
IDC said it sees Apple Watch and the watchOS operating system capturing some 58 percent of the market this year, projecting sales for 13.9 million units. Apple has not released any sales figures so far.
Android and Android Wear, the operating system from Google, is expected to grab a 17.4 percent market share with 4.1 million units selling this year, according to IDC.
Smart wristwear, including watches and bands that are capable of running third-party applications, is a key growth driver, according to IDC.
This includes the Apple Watch, Motorola's Moto 360, Samsung's Gear S-series, and Pebble's Time.
"We are at a stage now where more vendors are getting into this segment, setting the stage for more selection and ultimately more volumes," said IDC's Ramon Llamas.
Copenhagen, Denmark -Those trying to snag a table at Denmark's Noma restaurant may be out of luck as "the world's best eatery" will close by the end of 2016 and re-open on an urban farm in 2017.
"It makes sense to have your own farm, as a restaurant of this calibre," the influential restaurant's chef and founder, Rene Redzepi, told the New York Times.
The restaurant, named the world's best four times by Restaurant magazine, will move to what is currently a derelict warehouse near the self-governed Copenhagen hippie community of Christiania.
Its new farm will be built by putting a greenhouse on its roof and by digging up an adjacent asphalt lot. Parts of it will float on water, Redzepi said.
The celebrated kitchen will move away from traditional tasting menus in favour of dishes reflecting the season even more closely than they already do, resulting in a variety of wild game in the autumn, seafood in winter and a completely vegetarian menu in spring and summer.
Business at Noma -- where booking a table can be near impossible -- was still booming, but the move was necessary to "progress", Redzepi said.
A Noma spokesman confirmed the closure to AFP but declined to comment further.
The two-Michelin-star restaurant grabbed the number one spot in Restaurant magazine's prestigious annual ranking in 2010, 2011, 2012 and 2014.
This year it finished third behind Spain's "El Celler de Can Roca" and Italy's "Osteria Francescana".
It is currently based in a converted 18th-century shipping warehouse, where it has become a favourite of gourmets worldwide for using seasonal and local ingredients in dishes like pike perch and cabbages, and wild duck and pear.
In January Noma will begin a 10-week stint in Sydney, following a similar trend that saw it relocate to Tokyo for several weeks this year.
"We're bringing the entire team, from dishwasher to general manager," Redzepi said on the restaurant's website.
