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A Peek at the Not Distant Future

Welcome to tomorrow.

Posting on WorldHealth.com, Dr. Robert Goldman, M.D., PhD., offers some exciting and sometimes frightening insight into what lies ahead for mankind.

In 1998, Kodak had 170,000 employees and sold 85% of all photo paper worldwide. Within just a few years, their business model disappeared and they went bankrupt. What happened to Kodak will happen in a lot of industries in the next 10 years – and most people don’t see it coming. Did you think in 1998 that three years later you would never take pictures on paper film again? Digital cameras were invented in 1975. The first ones only had 10,000 pixels, but followed Moore’s law. So as with all exponential technologies, it was a disappointment for a long time, before it became way superior and went mainstream in only a few years.

Now the same thing is happening with Artificial Intelligence, health, autonomous and electric cars, education, 3D printing, agriculture and jobs.

Software will disrupt most traditional industries in the next 5-10 years.
Uber is just a software tool, they don’t own any cars, and are now the biggest taxi company in the world. AirBnB is now the biggest hotel company in the world, although they don’t own any properties.

Artificial Intelligence: Computers are becoming exponentially better in understanding the world. This year, a computer beat the best Go player in the world, 10 years earlier than expected. In the US, young lawyers already don’t have jobs. You can get legal advice (more or less basic stuff) from IBM Watson within seconds, with 90% accuracy compared with 70% accuracy when done by humans. So if you study law, stop immediately. There will be 90% fewer lawyers in the future, only specialists will remain.

Watson already helps nurses diagnose cancer, four times more accurately than human nurses. Facebook now has a pattern recognition software that can recognize faces better than humans. In 2030, computers will become more intelligent than humans.

Automatic cars: In 2018 the first self driving cars will appear for the public. They will be mainstream just two years later. Around 2020, the complete automobile industry will start to be disrupted. You won’t want to own a car anymore. You will call a car with your phone, it will show up at your location and drive you to your destination. You will not need to park it, you only pay for the driven distance and can be productive while driving. Our kids will never get a driver’s licence and will never own a car. It will change the cities, because we will need 90-95% fewer cars for that. We can transform former parking space into parks. Each year 1.2 million people die in car accidents worldwide. We now have one accident every 100,000km (62,000 miles), with autopilot driving that will drop to one accident in 10 million km (6.2 million miles). That will save a million lives each year.

Cities will be less noisy because all cars will run on electricity, which will become incredibly cheap and clean.

Most car companies might become bankrupt. Traditional car companies try the evolutionary approach and just build a better car, while tech companies (Tesla, Apple, Google) will try the revolutionary approach and build a computer on wheels. A lot of engineers from Volkswagen and Audi are terrified of Tesla.

Insurance companies will have massive trouble because without accidents, the insurance will become 100x cheaper. Their car insurance business model will disappear.

Real estate business is bound to change. Because if you can work while you commute, people will move further away from their job sites.

Solar production has been on an exponential curve for 30 years, but you can only now see the impact. Last year, more solar energy stations were installed worldwide than fossil. The price for solar energy will drop so much that all coal companies will be defunct by 2025.

With cheap electricity comes cheap and abundant water. Desalination now only needs 2kWh per cubic meter. We don’t have scarce water in most places, we only have scarce drinking water. Imagine what will be possible if anyone can have as much clean water as he wants, for nearly no cost.

Learn much more about tomorrow at:
http://www.worldhealth.net/news/predictions-technology-health/

Triskaidekaphobia and 12 More Superstitions

THE NUMBER 13
The belief that the number 13 is unlucky is so widespread that its origins are unclear — different theories link it to Christian tradition (specifically related to the Last Supper, where Judas is said to have sat at the thirteenth place at the table); Viking lore (the trickster god Loki being the 13th god); and the Persian zodiac (in which there are 12 signs, leaving the number 13 to represent chaos.) The specific fear of Friday the 13th dates back to the 19th century, combining two old superstitions: the fear of the number 13 with the belief that Fridays are unlucky days.The morbid fear of the number 13 is technically known as “triskaidekaphobia”, and is so common that many buildings have no floor 13 — going straight from 12 to 14.

BLACK CATS
Black cats have long been seen in Western cultures as an omen of bad luck — they have long been associated with witches, and many cultures believe that a black cat crossing your path means you will suffer disaster or even death. Gamblers are especially fearful of the black cat curse — many of them believe that if they see a black cat while going to a casino, they should abandon their plans to gamble there. However, it’s not all bad news for the black cats; in some cultures, including in Japan, Great Britain and Ireland, the opposite is true, and black cats are seen as bringers of good luck.

THE SCOTTISH PLAY
Actors can be a superstitious group — and nowhere is that more apparent than around Shakespeare’s play Macbeth. The superstition holds that saying “Macbeth” in a theatre (outside of actually performing the play itself) will bring misfortune on the production — instead, actors will simply call it “The Scottish Play”. Productions of Macbeth are said to have been magnets for disaster from its very first performance — when legend has it the lead actor was killed when a real dagger was used instead of a stage prop.

The other best-known actorly superstition is that wishing someone “good luck” before they go on stage will actually bring them the opposite — so instead actors tell each other to “break a leg”, on the grounds that wishing them bad fortune will presumably also bring about the opposite. The exact origins of this superstition are unclear, but it’s thought to have originated in the 1920s.

GARGOYLES
Having a series of grotesque statues and faces on the outside of your building might not seem like an obvious thing to do, but the frequency of them — from the “Hunky Punks” and rather obscene “Sheela na gigs” of Ireland and the UK to true Gargoyles. To get technical, it’s a form of “apotropaic” magic; something intended to scare away evil. And true gargoyles serve another, much more practical purpose as well — their mouths are spouts that channel rainwater off the roofs of churches.

DEAD MAN’S HAND
The Dead Man’s Hand — a pair of black eights and a pair of black aces, plus a fifth unspecified card — is widely held to be an unlucky hand in poker (even though it’s actually a pretty good hand). Why? Because legend has it that those were the cards held by Wild Bill Hickok, the famous Wild West lawman and gunslinger, when he was shot and killed while playing poker in Deadwood in 1876. There’s little actual evidence that the story’s true — no contemporary accounts say what cards he was holding — but that hasn’t stopped superstitious gamblers believing it. If you ever see a character in a film get dealt this hand, there’s a good chance they’ll meet a sticky end very soon.

CROSSING FINGERS
Crossing your fingers to wish for good luck (or, secretly, to get you out of keeping a promise) is common around the world — but its origins are unclear. It seems to be most common in Christian countries, suggesting that it’s related to the Christian sign of the cross. However, other suggestions include it being an old Pagan or Norse gesture, or possibly a good luck superstition created by archers during the “Hundred Year War” between England and France (archers used their two main fingers to draw back their bow).

BROKEN MIRRORS
It’s a common superstition that a broken mirror will result in seven years bad luck — it’s thought this belief can be traced back to the idea that a mirror captures part of your soul. So when a mirror breaks, part of your soul gets broken too. That’s also why some cultures cover up all mirrors and reflective surfaces in a house where someone has died — so their soul can leave the building without getting trapped in the mirror.

GROUNDHOG DAY
The superstition that a large rodent can predict the weather (if he sees his shadow, there’ll be an early spring; if he doesn’t, there’s six more weeks of winter) might seem ridiculous. But that doesn’t stop it being extremely popular in the U.S. and Canada — even more so since one of the most famous groundhog, Punxsutawney Phil of Pennsylvania, was immortalized in the film of the same name. The tradition of animals’ shadows predicting the coming of actually dates back to an old German superstition around Candlemas Day, which was brought to the Americas by Germanic immigrants. But how good is Punxsutawney Phil’s record as a meteorologist? Pretty bad, actually — according to the Stormfax Weather Almanac, tracing his record for over a century, he’s only been right 39 percent of the time.

SPILLED SALT
It’s an old superstition that accidentally spilling salt is a bad omen: it’s said that it draws its origins from the Christian tradition, due to Judas Iscariot having supposedly spilled salt at the Last Supper shortly before he betrayed Jesus. In fact, its origins are probably much more pragmatic: until recent times, salt was really expensive, so spilling it was already rather unlucky. It was also used as a sign of friendship and hospitality — spilling salt offered to you by your host was a bad sign. Much like black cats, spilled salt can work both ways — another common superstition holds that throwing a pinch of salt over your left shoulder brings good luck and wards off evil.

666
Hexakosioihexekontahexaphobia — that’s the technical name for the fear of the number 666, otherwise known as the Number of the Beast. This superstition undeniably comes from Christianity — the number is mentioned as being representative of Satan in the Biblical Book of Revelations. It’s gained in popularity through being heavily featured in films like The Omen, and was taken so seriously by former U.S. President Ronald Reagan that when he moved into a private house at the end of his presidency, he had the address changed from 666 to 668. However, it might be that everyone’s got it wrong all this time — in 2005, a group of scholars announced that they discovered evidence that the number was originally supposed to be 616, not 666.

WALKING UNDER LADDERS
Walking underneath a ladder is widely held to be bad luck. Despite some theories suggesting that this is to do with the triangle formed by a ladder representing the Christian Holy Trinity, the most likely explanation is far more simple and obvious: walking under laddders is quite dangerous. It’s actually just sensible health and safety advice dressed up as a superstition.

CHAIN LETTERS
Chain letters are an old phenomenon, dating back to at least 1888 — letters that ask the recipient to copy them and pass them on, often warning the superstitious that some terrible fate will await them if they don’t (often giving examples of bad things that have happened to people who didn’t forward them). And the arrival of email and then social networks — making it even easier to pass messages along — has only increased the popularity of chain mail. While many chain letters are money-making scams, the reasons behind the more superstitious ones are unclear, beyond a simple desire to see how far something will spread.

THE BLACK WITCH
The Black Witch moth (Ascalapha odorata) is seen as an omen of death and misfortune in superstitions across the Caribbean, Central and South America. In Mexico, it’s believed that one of the moths flying into the house of someone who is sick means that their death is close. In Jamaica, where it’s known as the “duppy bat”, it’s thought to be a lost soul and bring bad luck with it. While this moth gets singled out for superstition, it’s not alone — moths of all kinds have long been associated with death in Central American cultures. The Black Witch was featured in a gruesome manner in the novel The Silence of the Lambs — but was replaced with the Death’s Head moth in the film version, presumably because that moth looks scarier.

Top 15 Home Design Features

What’s hot in the housing market today? Zillow looked at design features that sell homes at the best price and with the shortest listing time and turned up 15 features ranging from barn doors to outdoor kitchens, that topped the list. Anything craftsman-style, rectangular farmhouse sinks and solid surface countertops all proved to be hits.

Zillow Digs screened more than 2 million listings for homes sold between January 2014 and March 2016 and looked for the keywords that had the best effect on how much more than the expected price and how much faster they sold.
Here are the top 15 design features:
1. Barn Door – 13.4% of homes sell for above expected values and homes sell 57 days faster than expected.
2. Shaker Cabinetry – 9.6% of of homes sell for above expected values and homes sell 45 days faster than expected.
3. Farmhouse Sink – 7.9% of of homes sell for above expected values and homes sell 58 days faster than expected.
4. Subway Tile – 6.9% of of homes sell for above expected values and homes sell 63 days faster than expected.
5. Quartz Countertops – 6% of of homes sell for above expected values and homes sell 50 days faster than expected.
6. Craftsman Style – 5.4% of of homes sell for above expected values and homes sell 14 days faster than expected.
7. Exposed Interior Brick – 4.9% of of homes sell for above expected values and homes sell 36 days faster than expected.
8. Pendant Light – 4.6% of of homes sell for above expected values and homes sell 48 days faster than expected.
9. Frameless Shower – 4.6% of of homes sell for above expected values and homes sell 38 days faster than expected.
10. Heated Floors – 4.3% of of homes sell for above expected values and homes sell 28 days faster than expected.
11. Stainless Steel Appliances – 4.2% of of homes sell for above expected values and homes sell 42 days faster than expected.
12. Granite Countertops – 4.1% of of homes sell for above expected values and homes sell 38 days faster than expected.
13. Kitchen Backsplash – 4.1% of homes sell for above expected values and homes sell 46 days faster than expected.
14. Tankless Water Heaters – 4% of homes sell for above expected values and homes sell 43 days faster than expected.
15. Outdoor Kitchens – 3.7% of homes sell for above expected value and homes sell 19 days faster than expected.

The Future Is Arriving

For the past three decades, we’ve been hearing forecasts of smart homes that will respond to our every need. The list of over-promised features includes such things as smart refrigerators that will order what you need from the grocery store, lighting that automatically turns on or off when you enter or leave a room, heating and cooling that adjusts itself constantly to your desires and even robot butlers.

Fantasy? Perhaps, but your smart phone actually is bringing the smart home future to you now. There are now ways to control every aspect of your nest from your palm, from how bright your bedroom is to how much energy you use every month.

Here are some of the ways you can control your home today, whether you’re there or not.

Music that follows you around. It now is easier than ever to throw what you’re listening to from your phone to your home speakers – even if those speakers aren’t internet-enabled. You probabaly have heard of Sonos, one of the market-leading connected speaker systems, and they undoubtedly put out beautiful high-quality sound with seamless syncing around the home. But, with speakers starting from US $199, it’s an expensive solution – and there are now much cheaper options providing you have some speakers already.

Gramofon is a classy-looking box that connects your speakers to your WiFi for US $69 and you can link them together to play the same or different music across your house using Qualcomm AllPlay. Similarly, Google’s Chromecast Audio is a smaller version of the same idea, though it can’t be wired into your home network with ethernet like the Gramofon.

There’s also the ingenious Vamp, which lets you turn any passive hi-fi speaker into a Bluetooth one – the tiny red box plugs into your normal black and red connections on the back of any speaker and even provides the power. With Vamp you could rescue any ancient working speaker and make it smart for about $60.

Appliances that do the hard work for you. Tea lovers’ dreams have come true with the iKettle (US $180), a Wi-Fi enabled kettle that you can turn on from your phone. It tells you when the water’s boiled and even keeps it warm until you get there. Th iKettle can send a message to your phone first thing in the morning or when you arrive home after a long day, asking if you’d like to turn the kettle on so the water will be boiled by the time you make it to the kitchen. The same firm also makes a connected coffee maker if that’s your caffeinated beverage of choice.

Other appliances are seeing similar features added, too. Forgetting to press “go” on the washing machine as you’re heading out the door ceases to be a problem with connected washers, which can be controlled from an app on your phone. Most manufacturers now offer this, with laundry apps from brands like LG and Samsung even diagnosing technical problems with your machine and telling you how to fix them without calling a repairman.

In fact, everything from your oven to your dishwasher can be controlled from your phone with appliance ranges like Hoover’s Wizard. Whether you want to ask how much cooking time’s left on your food, get an alert when your chilled drink’s reached ideal temperature or just remotely switch on the cooker hood light, it’s all a tap away. LG’s taken things even further with the LG Homechat, which lets you text your appliances.

Homechat responds to commands like “monitor all products,” (gives you a status update), “going to bed” (stops music after 10 minutes), and Siri-style “what is this song?” inquiries. It’s as zany as it sounds, but as AI and language processing improve, natural conversation will be the way we interact with everything.

While we’re waiting for robot butlers, we do at least have robot vacuums. Neato’s BotVac can be controlled not only from your phone but from your smartwatch too – Apple or Android. Cost is around $800 US.

Stopping the worries when out and about. What about forgetting to turn things off, such as the iron, hair rollers, the heating or air conditioning? All these things and more can be controlled from the cloud.

The Heat Genius system allows you to turn the heating and hot water on and off from a smartphone app, and even lets you control and schedule room heating individually. Similarly, Google has raised temperatures by buying out Nest and offering the Learning Thermostat through the Google Play store, alongside the Nest Cam home security camera and Nest Protect smoke alarm.

Nest products work seamlessly with each other, connecting to a range of third-party smart home tech including Philips Hue lights and Whirlpool washers. It’s an Apple-like approach, encouraging people to look out for the “Works With Nest” logo before making a purchase – much like the “Designed for iPhone” badge Apple uses.

The Nest range is facing tough competition from tado, though: a heating system that claims to pay for itself within a year. It uses your smartphone location to automatically turn the heating off when everyone’s left the house then turn it on again when someone comes back.

Smart plugs are the anxious user’s best friend, letting you check something’s switched off when you’re not at home. Belkin’s WeMo and D-Link’s Home Smart are two of the many branded versions of this handy product. Smart plugs can switch anything on or off from your phone.

Ambience and Security. The new connected showerhead from French firm Start & Blue uses Bluetooth to connect to an app that lets you set your ideal shower length. LED lights on the Hydrao Smart Shower then change from green through to amber and red to tell you when you’ve used too much water.

Systems like Philips Hue and LIFX have made a huge splash with their smart lightbulbs, which let you turn your lights on or off and change the colour with your phone or tablet. Other apps sync your lighting with the beat of your music or flash when you’ve been tagged in a Facebook photo. Wearables company Misfit has also taken on the smart bulb market with Bolt, a connected bulb that, can be controlled through your phone or, for extra futurism, by tapping on Misfit’s fitness wristbands

The Bolt isn’t the only smart bulb to do more than light up a million colors, either: the latest round of products can also boost your WiFi signal (Sengled Boost Wifi Bulb), and even play music (Mipow Playbulb).

You can put a Roost smart battery in your home fire alarm. The WiFI-enabled 9V battery hooks your alarm up to the cloud so it can tell your phone when your fire alarm’s blaring and you’re not there.

Despite the array of products noted above, the market is still pretty fragmented. In the future, products from disparate manufacturers may work together harmoniously. The future of smart homes isn’t just appliances talking to you, but talking to each other. Your washing machine vould let the dishwasher know it’ll be using the hot water for a while, your oven mighjt the ventilation fan know it’s burnt the chicken and might need some help with ventilation.

Spring Is In the Air

Spring fever is real. If you’ve noticed an extra spring in your step because of the weather, it’s not a coincidence. Warmer days directly influence mood and behavior.

Being outdoors in the sun is linked with a mood boost. A 2004 University of Michigan study that found people who spent at least 30 minutes outside in pleasant weather had happier moods. And a 2014 UM study found that being outside could lead to a better mindset and reduced stress.

The weather-mood connection is a positive one, but the original University of Michigan researchers found that positive attitudes seemed to melt in particularly sweltering weather Other studies back that up.

Thanks, Ben Franklin. Folks are generally happier when the days are longer as they are thanks to Daylight Savings Time. There’s grumbling about lost sleep when we make the annual time switch, but the positive is there is more sunlight and people feel better when there’s more sunshine.

And, yes, in spring a young man’s fancy does turn to love. Warm temperatures may put you in the mood, yeah, that mood. There appears to be a seasonal connection to an increase in human conception, according to Scientific American. In Europe, there seems to be a 10 percent above-average increase in births during the month of March, meaning the babies were conceived around June. Research also suggests that men’s testosterone and women’s hormones linked to ovulation spike to above-average levels in June, the publication reported.

Another way folks indulge in Spring fever seems is through a more active lifestyle, according to experts at the University of North Carolina. Exercise can lead to a boost in endorphins — the same feel-good chemical that may come from warmer weather.

Warm weather also may make you more inventive. The University of Michigan study found that being outdoors in enjoyable climates can improve memory and broaden cognitive style, which is linked to more creative thoughts.

Have a Fun, Safe April Fools’ Day

History.com Tells us that the annual tradition of playing practical jokes on each other began with English pranksters on this day in 1700.

The origin of the day, however, is not quite that clear. Also known as All Fools’ Day, April 1 has been celebrated for several centuries by different cultures. Some historians speculate that April Fools’ Day dates back to 1582, when France switched from the Julian calendar to the Gregorian calendar. People who were slow to get the news or failed to recognize that the start of the new year had moved to January 1 and continued to celebrate it during the last week of March through April 1 became the butt of jokes and hoaxes. These included having paper fish placed on their backs and being referred to as “poisson d’avril” (April fish), said to symbolize a young, easily caught fish and a gullible person.

Some historians link April Fools’ Day to ancient festivals such as Hilaria, which was celebrated in Rome at the end of March and involved people dressing up in disguises. There’s also speculation that April Fools’ Day was tied to the vernal equinox, or first day of spring in the Northern Hemisphere, when Mother Nature fooled people with changing, unpredictable weather.

April Fools’ Day spread throughout Britain during the 18th century. In Scotland, the tradition became a two-day event, starting with “hunting the gowk,” in which people were sent on phony errands (gowk is a word for cuckoo bird, a symbol for fool) and followed by Tailie Day, which involved pranks played on people’s derrieres, such as pinning fake tails or “kick me” signs on them.

In modern times, people have gone to great lengths to create elaborate April Fools’ Day hoaxes. Newspapers, radio and TV stations and web sites have participated in the April 1 tradition of reporting outrageous fictional claims that have fooled their audiences. In 1957, the BBC reported that Swiss farmers were experiencing a record spaghetti crop and showed footage of people harvesting noodles from trees; numerous viewers were fooled. In 1985, Sports Illustrated tricked many of its readers when it ran a made-up article about a rookie pitcher named Sidd Finch who could throw a fastball over 168 miles per hour. In 1996, Taco Bell, the fast-food restaurant chain, duped people when it announced it had agreed to purchase Philadelphia’s Liberty Bell and intended to rename it the Taco Liberty Bell. In 1998, after Burger King advertised a “Left-Handed Whopper,” scores of clueless customers requested the fake sandwich.

Have fun with jokes and pranks today, but keep them safe and harmless.

Come to think of it, keeping your things safe and unharmed is a big part of what we do at Dino’s Storage. If you have things to store, we’re the go-to place. Come see us in Des Moines, Winnipeg or Omaha. We also have rental trucks, locks, boxes and moving supplies to meet your needs.

Smartphones Are Getting Outsmarted; Apps Will Be the Next to Fall

You might have noticed this development if you got a new phone over the holidays. Or you will see it if you watch what comes out of the 2016 Consumer Electronics Show opening this week in Las Vegas. Phones are where laptops were about a decade ago. The design and purpose are fixed and well-understood, so all that’s left are incremental improvements – making them a little thinner, adding a little more power or coming up with an occasional new feature like Samsung’s notifications along an outer edge.

From now on, Newsweek reports, all the real innovation will happen outside your phone – in apps, the cloud and other connected devices. “We’re at the cusp of a transition to wanting our technology on us and around us,” Phillippe Kahn, one of the great inventors of mobile technology, said recently. “Instead of having to carry gadgets, technology will just be there. The more we forget the technology, the better.”

Intriguingly, this new world will also be a threat to apps as we know them.

This isn’t to say that smartphones are finished as a business. About 3.5 billion of the planet’s 7 billion people own one. That leaves maybe another billion more potential customers – if you leave out small children, the 1.3 billion who live on less than $1.25 a day and the grandmothers tightly clutching flip phones. And nearly everyone who owns a smartphone today will buy a new one every couple of years, if not more frequently.

Yet, over time we are going to rely less on our phones, and instead get more things done by connecting to applications and services through a dizzying variety of things. Our attention will move from our phone screens to the ether – we’ll feel that our apps are in the air around us, and can be accessed through any connected device we encounter.

Young consumers already seem to be tilting this way. In a survey by Ericsson Consumer Labs, released in December, half of respondents said that by 2021 they might not even be using a smartphone. They expect to access apps in what they say are more convenient ways.

Like what? Cars, for example. Today, if you want your Spotify music and GPS maps and voice calls in the car, you carry your phone into the car, prop it up in the cup holder, and try to stab the screen with your thumb while going 72 miles per hour. We’ll come to realize this is cretinous, not to mention hazardous. Cars of the next decade will connect to the network, respond to voice commands and display info like your playlists or maps on a heads-up display in the windshield. Instead of opening a discrete app to do something, you’ll just say what you want – “play random Clash songs” or “pay my electric bill.”

Amazon’s Echo is another nudge in that direction – along with Apple’s Siri and Google Now. Set up an Echo at home, and the cylindrical device constantly listens for requests. Echo’s software comprehends a properly phrased request, then goes to the cloud to do it – no phone required. The technology is still in its rudimentary stage.

No single device is going to replace the smartphone. The cloud and artificial intelligence software are going to replace the smartphone. We’ll connect through whatever makes sense – a smartwatch, connected eyeglasses, a touch-screen kitchen counter, cars, Echo, Nest, Fitbit, Oculus Rift. Motorola Mobility recently patented a device that would get implanted under the skin and respond to voice commands. If a service needs to know who you are, it might scan your voice, face or fingerprint. No more remembering 259 user names and passwords.

Today each app focuses on one service, so anything you do on a device requires you to think first about which app to open. That’s a barrier when you just want to get something done. The technology needs to act more like a great personal assistant who already knows your preferences and understands your shorthand orders.

Plus, who wants to have to install a boatload of apps on your watch, car, implanted gadget and a dozen other devices? As Google director Aparna Chennapragada says, the goal has to be to “de-silo and unbundle the function of apps” so software like Google Now, Siri or Echo can mix and match app services to accomplish the task you requested. Once that happens, we won’t think of apps the way we do now. In fact, it’s likely we won’t think of apps at all.

The physical gadget of smartphone won’t go away – no more than laptops have gone away. The smartphone, though, is probably heading for a future as more of a pocket screen – something that allows you to watch videos, read news stories and take pictures when you’re out. It won’t be the center of your tech life – it will be an adjunct.

That’s another way smartphones are like laptops. Not so long ago, new laptops were exciting to buy. They contained our lives on their hard drives and were our windows to the world through the Internet. Now laptops seem more like work tools, and new ones don’t seem much different from the one you bought a few years ago. Much the same fate awaits smartphones.

On the flip side, next-generation refrigerators will connect to the network and come armed with sensors and AI software that can automatically take care of important things, like understanding that you just ordered General Tso’s chicken through Echo, noticing that you’re out of beer and ordering more to be delivered. Now that’s exciting.

The Christmas Tree

There are reports of decorated fir trees before the Middle Ages. Some believe that the real beginning of the Christmas tree as we know it may be attributed to the 16th Century German theologian Martin Luther or another clergyman of his time.
The clergyman, according to legend, was walking through a forest at night and was overcome by the beauty of the green fir trees against the starlit sky above. When he arrived home, he wanted to recreate the beautiful scene for his children as he told them about his walk. So he brought a small fir tree into the house and decorated it with lighted candles.
From this beginning, the custom of decorating a Christmas tree spread throughout Germany and into the rest of Europe.
It was introduced into England by Prince Albert, Queen Victoria’s German husband, in 1841.
The German immigrants brought the treasured tradition with them to America, and Christmas trees have been a cherished part of our holiday season ever since.
The Christmas tree has gained in popularity in America since the middle of the 19th Century and is perhaps the foremost feature of Christmas celebrations.
Along with the bright lights, now much safer that the earlier candles, trees are decorated with colorful balls, religious symbols such as angels and crosses, glittering tinsel and chains of popcorn and cranberries.
Under the tree, in Christian homes, will frequently be found a creche of the nativity scene reminding us of the night Christ was born.
Anyone who has seen the beauty of a Christmas tree reflected in the wonder of a little child’s eyes knows it is among the most treasured of our traditions.

The Traditions of Christmas

The traditions of Christmas in America have their roots in many lands, a reflection perhaps of the many nationalities and cultures that make up our nation of immigrants. In this blog we will take a look at the traditions emanating from Rumania and Syria.

From dawn until after sunset on Christmas Eve, Rumanian boys visit neighboring homes to sing a Christmas greeting, Colinde, for which they receive apples, cakes and coins. On Christmas Day they parade through the streets carrying a great wooden cross which is hung with little tinkling bells. The star is illuminated from within by a candle, and is decorated with a transparency of the Baby Jesus and the Magi. Roast pig is the principal food of Christmas dinner.

An ancient Rumanian custom, still practiced today, is called “Blessing the Danube.” Clad in costumes depicting Pontius Pilate, Herod and other biblical characters, people gather at the river bank to sing carols. A young boy breaks the ice and a wooden cross is thrown into the water. All scramble after it for the rescuer will have extraordinary fortune in the coming year.

Christmas Eve in Syria is spent in worship and prayer. A bonfire of vine stems is made in the middle of each church in memory of the Magi who were cold from their journey.

Many Syrians journey to Bethlehem to attend midnight services in the Holy Land. Christmas Day is observed chiefly in the home with prayers and quiet rejoicing.

Young Syrian boys and girls, masked and dressed in gay costumes, go singing from door to door and receive coins, eggs and candies in return.

Legend tells that the youngest camel who carried the Wise Men to Bethlehem fell down, exhausted by the journey. The Christ Child blessed the camel and conferred immortality upon it. For this reason, a camel brings gifts to the children on New Year’s Day. Before going to bed that night, boys and girls set a bowl of water and wheat outside the house for the camel. In the morning, the good find gifts and the naughty find a black mark on their wrists.

The Traditions of Christmas

In Poland families end a fast on Christmas Eve and gather for a dinner to honor the Holy Child. Before supper is served, the father of the house breaks the Christmas wafers, which are marked with Nativity scenes and have been blessed by the church. The father distributes the pieces to all who are present as tokens of peace and friendship. The meatless meal that follows has 12 courses, one for each Apostle.

In England, Christmas is a day of family gaiety and of feasting on turkey with roast potatoes, mince pies and plum puddings. Turkey also is the Christmas meal most chosen by Americans.

In Mexico, the flower of Holy Night, the poinsettia, is seen everywhere during the Christmas season and everywhere, in doorways and arches, there are pinatas. On Christmas Eve, children roam the streets breaking the pinatas with a long stick. When each is broken, a profusion of peanuts, fruits and candy showers down.

On Christmas Eve in Ireland, candles are lighted and placed in every window of the house and doors are left ajar. The candlelight and open door are symbols of welcome, assuring the Irish people that no couple seeking shelter for a Baby who is the son of God will be homeless. The candlelight must shine forth all night long, and may be snuffed only by those having the name of Mary.

A cup and saucer is placed on the table in each Irish home for the entertainment of wandering souls from purgatory, who are believed to come home for Christmas.