BMW is developing a remote-control valet parking system for cars that can be operated by a smartwatch. The sensor-filled BMW i3 car, which will be on display at the 2015 International CES in Las Vegas in January, integrates with smartwatch and can essentially self-park. According to the company, a driver could activate the "Remote Valet Parking Assistant" via an app, which then guides the vehicle to a parking spot all by itself. The car works with the help of laser sensors that scan the surrounding environment so it can move without running into anything. It will work in tandem with a digital site plan, so the car has a map of the environment, too.
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The US and Cuba will "cut loose the shackles of the past" and restore diplomatic relations for the first time in five decades, President Barack Obama said today as he announced an end to US policies frozen in time since the early days of the Cold War. Mr Obama said he had reached a historic agreement with Raúl Castro, the Cuban leader, to begin ending the long-running standoff between America and the Communist island just 90 miles from its shores. Under the terms of a deal secretly negotiated with the help of Pope Francis, Cuba and the US will restore diplomatic ties and reopen their embassies in each others' capitals for the first time since 1961. Mr Obama's decision brings an end to American presidents' decades-old policy of isolating Cuba in the hope that it would eventually lead to the collapse of the Communist regime. "We will end an outdated approach that for decades has failed to advance our interests," Mr Obama said. "Instead we will begin to normalise relations between our two countries." Mr Castro, the younger brother of Fidel Castro, addressed the Cuban people at the same time Mr Obama was speaking from the White House. "This decision of President Obama deserves the respect and acknowledgement of our people," he said.
Under the deal, Americans will be able to travel more freely to Cuba, send money more easily to family members who live there and use their credit cards on the island for the first time. The US is also expected to remove Cuba from a list of nations it accuses of sponsoring terrorism. Mr Obama does not have the power to lift the trade embargo on Cuba, which bans American companies from exporting their goods to the island. That would take a vote in Congress, which is unlikely as Republicans are taking control of both the House and Senate in January. Republicans immediately attacked the deal as a "mindless concession" to a Communist dictatorship and Cuban-Americans in Florida, who are fiercely opposed to the Castro regime, reacted furiously to the news. People in Cuba meanwhile crowded into shops and hotel lobbies to listen to their leader speaking on television. Many burst into applause when the aging revolutionary finished his address. “Everyone here in Cuba is excited about this, it means something," said Vincente Morin Aguado, a journalist for the Havana Times. "This is an important and historic moment." Church bells rang out across Havana as the news of the long-awaited thaw in relations with the US was announced. Mr Obama has hoped to normalise relations with Cuba since taking office in 2009 but his ambitions were complicated by Cuba's arrest that year of Alan Gross, an American subcontractor working in Havana. Mr Gross was prosecuted for espionage and sentenced to 15 years in prison. The 65-year-old's health deteriorated dramatically during his time in captivity. As part of the agreement, Mr Castro agreed to release Mr Gross as well as an unnamed Cuban who spied for the US and has been held in a Havana prison for nearly 20 years. Mr Obama called the operative "one of the most important intelligence agents that the United States has ever had in Cuba". Mr Obama in return released three of "the Cuban five", a quintet of Cuban spies who were imprisoned for spying on the US. The talks between the two sides began in secret last year and a number of meetings were held between negotiators in Canada and at the Vatican. Earlier this year, Pope Francis wrote to both Mr Obama and Mr Castro and urged them to "initiate a new phase in relations" between their countries. The deal was finalised at a secret meeting in the Vatican in October. Today, the Pope offered his "warm congratulations for the historic decision" and said the Catholic Church would continue to offer their support as the two sides "strengthen their bilateral relations and promote the well-being of their respective citizens". Both leaders thanked the Pope in their speeches and Mr Obama said his "moral example shows us the importance of pursuing the world as it should be, rather than simply settling for the world as it is". Mr Obama and Mr Castro spoke for nearly an hour on Tuesday, in the first significant discussion between an American and Cuban leader since 1959. The pair met briefly and shook hands at a memorial for Nelson Mandela a year ago. A spokesman for Mr Obama said it was possible the US president could visit Havana. There was no immediate reaction from Fidel Castro, the 88-year-old former Cuban leader whose life has been dedicated to opposing the US. The two sides are expected to move rapidly to re-open their embassies but Mr Castro warned: "This does not mean that everything is solved". The US said it would continue to stridently criticise Cuba over its human rights record and its suppression of democracy. Mr Obama will also face a difficult, if not impossible task of convincing Republicans and hawkish Democrats to lift the trade embargo that has been in place since 1960, a year before the President's own birth. Republicans vowed to do everything they could to thwart what Marco Rubio, a Cuban-American senator from Florida, called a "dangerous and desperate attempt by the President”. Mr Obama leaves office in two years' time and a Republican president could decide to reverse his decision. Jeb Bush, the son of George HW Bush and a leading Republican contender for the White House, said the US should not "negotiating with a repressive regime". President and Michelle Obama personally identify with everyday experiences of racial bias in America that have underpinned recent protests across the country, they told People magazine in an interview to be released Friday.
“Barack Obama was a black man that lived on the South Side of Chicago, who had his share of troubles catching cabs," Michelle Obama told the magazine. On one occasion, she said, her husband “was wearing a tuxedo at a black-tie dinner, and somebody asked him to get coffee.” President Obama said he's even been mistakenly treated as a valet. “There’s no black male my age, who’s a professional, who hasn’t come out of a restaurant and is waiting for their car and somebody didn’t hand them their car keys," he said, according to excerpts of the interview released today. The first lady also described being mistreated at a Target store in suburban Washington, during ashopping trip she took in 2011. "Even as the first lady," she told the magazine, "during the wonderfully publicized trip I took to Target, not highly disguised, the only person who came up to me in the store was a woman who asked me to help her take something off a shelf." She said the incidents are "the regular course of life" for African-Americans and a "challenge" for the country to overcome. Though they've lived inside the White House bubble for six years, the Obamas have been making the point that they are still in touch with the experience of minority communities. President Obama has pushed back against criticism that he has not been aggressive enough in talking about issues of race and justice, particularly involving African-American men. "If you look at after what happened with Michael Brown, if you looked at what happened after Trayvon, if you looked at the decision after Eric Garner, I'm being pretty explicit about my concern, and being pretty explicit about the fact that this is a systemic problem, that black folks and Latinos and others are not just making this up," Obama told BET in an interview earlier this month. "I describe it in very personal terms." The president told People that he applauds the efforts of other prominent African-American athletes and celebrities to speak out against police brutality using the "I Can't Breathe" slogan, inspired by the case of Eric Garner, the Staten Island man who died after he was put in a choke hold by a New York City police officer. President Obama has not directly weighed in on the case. “I think LeBron did the right thing," Obama said of Cleveland Cavaliers star LeBron James, who wore a shirt with the slogan on the court. "We forget the role that Muhammad Ali, Arthur Ashe, and Bill Russell played in raising consciousness. I’d like to see more athletes do that -- not just around this issue, but around a range of issues.” Isabella Cruise, the adopted daughter of Nicole Kidman and Tom Cruise, is working as a hairdresser in London, according to new reports.
Isabella recently finished a 12-month diploma course at the prestigious Sassoon Academy. The course costs nearly $24,000 and is run by the company set up by hairdressing legend Vidal Sassoon. Isabella is now working at the academy’s high-class London salon, thanks to her training. “Isabella has been getting stuck in at work and doesn’t make a fuss about who her parents are. Some of her workmates don’t even realize,” a source told the Daily Mail. Isabella has also changed her look multiple times in the past year or two, having been spotted with long blonde hair, then short green hair, a blue bob, and even a bright red shaved head. Isabella famously chose to stay with Tom after his divorce from Nicole, even after Cruise became involved with Scientology. Isabella and brother Connor are reportedly involved in the religion as well. But she has recently revamped her personal life, enjoying hanging out at new bars and restaurants with her fellow stylists. “She now has a wider circle of friends and has broadened her horizons,” a source told The Sun. Meanwhile, Nicole was left behind by both Isabella and brother Connor, but she still sees the children sometimes and is proud of them. “They are generous, kind and hardworking,” she told Women’s Weekly magazine earlier this year. “And these are traits that I love to see in my children.” A few months back, people far and wide, including celebrities, filmed videos of themselves being immersed in ice water as part of the ALS “ice bucket” challenge. Hey, we did it too (but we also donated, thank you very much)! And while there is nothing wrong with putting a spotlight on Lou Gehrig’s disease, as so many people do battle with it, actor Samuel Jackson says that he’d like to see the same enthusiasm used for that movement be applied to speaking out against and addressing police brutality.
Jackson posted a video where he asked those in Hollywood to use their platform to speak out against “racist police”: “All you celebrities out there who poured ice water on your head, here’s a chance to do something else. I challenge all of you to sing the ‘We Ain’t Gonna Stop ‘Til People Are Free’ song. Here we go: I can hear my neighbor crying, ‘I can’t breathe’/Now I’m in the struggle, and I can’t leave’/Calling out the violence of the racist police/We ain’t gonna stop ’til people are free/We ain’t gonna stop, til people are free. C’mon, sing it out.” What do you think about Jackson asking those in Hollywood to use their platforms for this major issue? Check out Jackson singing the song below and share your thoughts: Oprah Winfrey’s Harpo Studios in Chicago has been sold by the former daytime talk show queen. After a bidding war that enticed investors from as far away as China, Winfrey’s Harpo Inc. agreed to sell the four-building campus to Sterling Bay Cos. For Winfrey, selling off the last of her commercial real estate represents a final step out of Chicago, which she left almost three years ago to form Oprah Winfrey Network in Los Angeles. “We have entered into a purchasing agreement with Sterling Bay for the four-building Harpo Studios campus in Chicago’s West Loop,” a spokeswoman for Harpo, which has more than 200 employees in Chicago, confirms in a statement. “The property will be leased back to Harpo for two years and the studio will continue to produce programming for OWN.” - See more at: http://madamenoire.com/496179/oprah-sells-harpo-studios/#sthash.QcmYRalB.dpuf
The world's first road capable of turning sunlight into energy officially opened for traffic Wednesday in the Netherlands.
Turning highways ... into power plants? It's actually a 230-foot-long bike path in the town of Krommenie. The road is a test route developed by the company SolaRoad. "SolaRoad is a world first that will put the Netherlands on the map as a leader in sustainable innovation," said Henk Kamp, the Dutch minister of economic affairs, at the opening. The path is made of concrete modules with solar cells and covered with a thin layer of tempered glass. The energy created from the road can power things like street and traffic lights or households, according to company officials. Testing will continue for three years to further develop solar roads, officials said. see more......http://edition.cnn.com/2014/11/12/tech/solar-road/ James was handing the couple Cavaliers jerseys in the hours between the least-loved NBA trip out there – a back-to-back scheduling that results in a late night trip through customs to Toronto. A photo op with the royal couple is clearly worth his time, though, with the Cavaliers supplying a “Cambridge” jersey for the former Miss Middleton and a “Prince George” jersey for the couple’s young son. Still, in royal culture, acting normally in a chummy photo setup is a no-no, but the Duchess of Cambridge hardly appeared to be set off. Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates has finally admitted that forcing users to press the Control-Alt-Delete key combination to log into a PC was a mistake. In an interview at a Harvard fundraising campaign, Gates discusses his early days building Microsoft and the all-important Control-Alt-Delete decision. If you've used an old version of the software or use Windows at work then you will have experienced the odd requirement. Gates explains the key combination is designed to prevent other apps from faking the login prompt and stealing a password. "It was a mistake," Gates admits to an audience left laughing at his honesty. "We could have had a single button, but the guy who did the IBM keyboard design didn't wanna give us our single button." David Bradley, an engineer who worked on the original IBM PC, invented the combination which was originally designed to reboot a PC. "I may have invented it, but Bill made it famous," Bradley said in an interview previously, leaving Bill Gates looking rather awkward. To this day the combination still exists in Windows 8, allowing users to lock a machine or access the task manager. While Windows 8 defaults to a new login screen, it's still possible to use the traditional Control-Alt-Delete requirement and a number of businesses running on Windows XP and Windows 7 will still use it every day. Just weeks after becoming a mom, Kelly Rowland is mourning the loss of her own.
The 33-year-old former Destiny's Child member confirmed that Doris Rowland Garrison died Tuesday in Atlanta at the age of 66. "It is with deep sadness that I announce the passing of my mother," Rowland said in a statement to The Insider With Yahoo. "She was an incredible soul who made countless sacrifices so that I could become the woman — and now mother — I am today. We humbly appreciate all the love and support and only ask for privacy during this difficult time." Those sacrifices include allowing a young Rowland to move in with Beyoncé Knowles and her family as the girls were carving out a path to stardom. "When I was 9, my mom was working as a live-in nanny," Rowland explained to Interviewmagazine in 2001. "We were rehearsing every day and, with my mom's schedule, she couldn't really take me back and forth to all the rehearsals. So in order to make it work, my mom asked Tina [Knowles], 'Could Kelly stay with you for the summer?' And the summer turned into [11 years]. But it was like a big ol' happy family because my mom came over every night to kiss me good night." |
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