The Billie Joe Armstrong and Kat Von D eyeliner collaboration is now available for purchase. Kat Von D sat down with Billboard to talk about the project:
“It has a lot of versatility; you can use it in different ways. But, I wanted to create a long-wear, high-pigmented, really easy to use eyeliner that would create something as messy and anti-precision as the way Billie Joe wears it on stage, or if you just want to do smoked out black eyes.”
Steve Dent, writing for Engadget:
The Switch has broken the US record for the fastest selling console ever, with 4.8 million units sold in just 10 months, Nintendo says. That shatters the previous record of 4 million US sales in the same time, also held by Nintendo with the Wii. Switch sales first opened on March 3rd, 2017, and it looks like strong holiday sales pushed the Switch over the top.
Speaking of that huge security bug, here’s Troy Wolverton reporting for Business Insider:
Intel CEO Brian Krzanich sold off a large portion of his stake in the company months after Google had informed the chipmaker of a significant security vulnerability in its flagship PC processors — but before the problem was publicly known.
The vulnerability, which affects processors from Intel, AMD, and ARM and could allow malicious actors to steal passwords and other secret data, became public this week.
The two problems, called Meltdown and Spectre, could allow hackers to steal the entire memory contents of a computer. There is no easy fix for Spectre, which could require redesigning the processors, according to researchers. As for Meltdown, the software patch needed to fix the issue could slow down computers by as much as 30 percent — an ugly situation for people used to fast downloads from their favorite online services.
Bad, this is all bad. More information can be found on the official website for these bugs. Yes, there’s an official website.
On a recent podcast, voice actor Ryan Ridley announced that Rick and Morty may not come back until 2019. Polygon summarizes:
Ridley pointed out that the script for Rick and Morty’s third season was finished in November 2016, about eight months before the show returned to Adult Swim. Since then, however, he hasn’t worked on it and is adamant that other writers haven’t either.
Creator of the show, Dan Harmon, was also recently called out by former Community writer Megan Ganz for workplace misconduct:
In turn, Ganz implied some form of workplace harassment, writing that it took her “years to believe in my talents again, to trust a boss when he complimented me and not cringe when he asked for my number.”
Although 2017 was an off-cycle election year, Anschutz opened up his checkbook again and gave close to $200,000 to Republican politicians and Super PACs. […] He gave Senator Tipton $2,700 in August. Tipton opposes same sex marriage and abortion. Mike Coffman, a member of the House who opposes abortion, received $5,400 from Anschutz in August.
Tom Breihan, writing for Stereogum:
The answer, of course, is that nobody at Coachella wants to see any fucking bands. (One exception might be Tomlinson’s old band, which only fits the loosest possible definition of the term “band.”) If you’ve been to the festival in recent years, you already know that rock bands basically don’t move the needle at all when it comes to that festival.
Padawan is a word that is being used more and more in a generic way to refer to learners, followers, or anyone just starting out. It was used in Star Wars: Episode I, the first of the prequels made by George Lucas and released in 1999, and refers to aspiring Jedi knights whose education is overseen by a Jedi master. […]
At any rate, what’s notable is that they are creating a new category of skilled pre-professional positions, and have found a word that corresponds to it. Whether or not the name sticks is a good question: it will take several years of gathering evidence to see whether or not this is the word we’re looking for.
Nichole Manna, writing for the Wichita Eagle:
Online gamers have said in multiple Twitter posts that the shooting of a man Thursday night by Wichita police was the result of a “swatting” hoax involving two gamers.
Swatting happened when someone makes a call to a police department with a false story of an ongoing crime – often with killing or hostages involved – in an attempt to draw a large number of police officers to a particular address. […]
Officers went to the 1000 block of McCormick, preparing for a hostage situation and they “got into position,” he said.
“A male came to the front door,” Livingston said. “As he came to the front door, one of our officers discharged his weapon.”
Julien Baker recently sat down with Substream Magazine:
She continues, sinking deeper into the question: “The narrative of the record is about starting off with this idea that because there are things about you that are challenging, difficult or ugly—or that you perceive as broken—that those things need to be eradicated because there are Bad things or Good things—capital B, capital G—and I just don’t think that that’s true. I’ve learned throughout the last couple of years from life that probably the [opposite] is true. That ugliest and most challenging parts of ourselves are often the things that make us most human and are our most precious tools in relating to each other.”
Jon Blistein, writing for Rolling Stone:
The Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled Monday that the FBI’s decision to list the Juggalos as a gang was not a “final agency” action, meaning it was not legally binding and could not be challenged in court.
The FBI classified the Juggalos as a gang in their 2011 National Gang Threat Assessment. The report referred to them as “a loosely-organized hybrid gang” that engages in “sporadic, disorganized, individualistic” crime such as, “simple assault, personal drug use and possession, petty theft and vandalism.”
Ilana Kaplan sat down with Kevin Devine over at the Village Voice:
“If I can not release a record for a few years, I would really like that,” says Devine, who has an eighteen-month-old daughter at home in Bay Ridge. “I have that Bad Books band with the Manchester Orchestra guys, and I do think it is likely — not guaranteed, but likely — that there would be a Bad Books record before there would be a Kevin record.” But Devine’s work ethic probably won’t stop him from focusing on music entirely: He’s admittedly restless. He’s always working on music, but he’s without a concrete plan for the first time in ages, and that’s fine by him.
Ariana Bacle sat down with Fall Out Boy over at Entertainment Weekly to talk about their upcoming album:
“We wanted to move the ball forward,” Wentz says. “The great thing about the way people listen to music now is there’s such disregard to genre. I think this record is expansive in that way.” Now, the 10-track collection, out Jan. 19, features everything from foot-stomping soul on “Heavens Gate” to EDM-tinged rock on “Young and Menace,” which Wentz calls “the musical equivalent of a cat chasing a laser beam.”
The Federal Communications Commission voted on Thursday to dismantle landmark rules regulating the businesses that connect consumers to the internet, granting broadband companies power to potentially reshape Americans’ online experiences.
The agency scrapped so-called net neutrality regulations that prohibited broadband providers from blocking websites or charging for higher-quality service or certain content. The federal government will also no longer regulate high-speed internet delivery as if it were a utility, like phone services.
Shit.
Bon Jovi, Nina Simone, Dire Straits, The Cars, and The Moody Blues are the 2018 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductees.
