Queen’s ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ is now a virtual reality music video

We’ve all heard the dramatic faux-opera that is Queen’s Bohemian Rhapsody — but have you ever wondered what a song like that might look like? The folks at Google did. In a new collaboration with Queen and Enosis VR, artists and developers at Google have created The Bohemian Rhapsody Experience — a virtual reality experiment created to take viewers on “a journey through frontman Freddie Mercury’s subconscious mind.” That’s a fancy way of saying they turned the iconic song into a 360-degree virtual reality music video.

The video itself is viewable only through the Bohemian Rhapsody Experience, but it can be seen in a basic 360-degree mode, or in stereoscopic 3D using Google Cardboard. The app takes viewers on a tour of a surreal mindscape of shapes, sound and animation — first leading them through a dreamlike mishmash of images that seems to represent Mercury’s mind, then onto the stage of a Queen Concert, complete with an animated band and then, after a brief stop in the underworld, into outer space for a neon-light finale. It’s gorgeous, and thanks to a spatial audio mix, fairly immersive.

It sounds like a project that came out of left field, but to folks familiar with the band’s lead guitarist, it makes a lot of sense. In addition to being a world-class guitarist and holding a PHD in astronomy, Brian May is also the director of the London Stereoscopic Company, where he maintains resources on streo photographs and helped create the OWL Virtual Reality Kit — a collapsible VR viewer in the vein of Google Cardboard. You can find that over on his company’s website. Just want the Bohemian Rhapsody app? The iOS version isn’t ready quiet yet, but Android users can head on over to Google Play.

Via: Verge

Source: YouTube, The Bohemian Rhapsody Experience

Google will resize email to fit your phone’s screen

Sure, you can open elaborately-crafted email using Gmail on your phone, but that doesn’t mean you want to. Most web-based messages are formatted for the desktop, and Gmail doesn’t tweak them to fit the confines of a mobile screen. Mercifully, you won’t have to squint quite so much in the days ahead: Google is introducing support for responsive design in Gmail before the end of September. If a message supports the adaptive technology, Google’s email app will automatically resize it to help you read the contents and tap links. You won’t notice the upgrade with every message, but it should give you more incentive to deal with a message right away instead of waiting until you’re at your computer.

Source: Official Gmail Blog

EU digital rules promise 5G, free WiFi and tougher copyright

The European Union isn’t done stepping up its digital initiatives. Officials have outlined proposed policies that are focused on dramatically increasing access to both the internet and the content you’ll find on it. Most of the proposals will be helpful, although not everyone is a fan — there are copyright changes that are rubbing Google the wrong way.

To start, the EU wants to “fully deploy” 5G mobile networks across its member countries by 2025. You’d theoretically get gigabit-class data across the continent. And you might not have to be picky about using it when traveling, either. While the EU has had to shelve its most recent free roaming plan, it still wants to “abolish” roaming charges. You should see a refined take on its plan next week.

However, you might not even have to depend on cellular data to get online. The proposal would also offer free wireless internet access (presumably, over WiFi) in the “main centers of public life” of every EU town by 2020. You wouldn’t get blanket coverage, but this would be particularly crucial in rural areas where cellular networks are spotty or non-existent, and local organizations don’t always have the means to offer free WiFi hotspots. If a €120 million ($135 million) grant receives approval, communities would have access to the funds before the end of 2017.

The EU is committed to its promises of erasing borders for media services, too. It wants to make content accessible across the Union, so you wouldn’t be limited to material offered in your home country. You could watch German Netflix shows while you’re visiting France, for example. You could also buy pay-TV movies and similar material from other countries, some of which might well be less expensive than it is at home. Broadcasters would still have control over whether or not their content is available in other countries.

It’s in the copyright space where things get tricky. The proposal would require better data sharing and transparency for creators, but it would also give press publishers rights that ensure they get a “fair share” of revenues for material they post online. Sound familiar? It should — it’s similar to laws in Germany and Spain that ask search engines like Google to pay up when they show an article snippet in their results. The EU contends that this is necessary to make sure writers are “paid fairly,” but Google unsurprisingly objects. It believes that the German and Spanish laws “failed,” and that these demands for payment ultimately hurt publishers by giving web users fewer reasons to click through to an article.

Moreover, the regulation might be bad news for YouTube. The proposal would require that services offering user-uploaded content take “appropriate and proportionate” steps to protect copyright. While this does include “content recognition technologies” (possibly a reference to YouTube’s Content ID), Google is worried that the measure would require screening content before it goes public, which would demand far more work. Google policy lead Caroline Atkinson claims that it would lead to an internet where every upload would have to be “cleared by lawyers.”

The proposal needs to clear both the European Parliament and individual governments to go forward. It may take a long time before the initiative takes effect, and that’s assuming there are no significant changes. If it does, though, Europe could have a very different digital landscape within the next decade. It would definitely be more connected, but there’s a concern that Google and others like it might scale back their European presence rather than make the effort to comply with new copyright laws.

Via: Ars Technica, Bloomberg, New York Times

Source: European Commission (1), (2)

Google offers $350,000 in prizes if you can hack a Nexus

Google has set aside at least $350,000 for its Project Zero Prize contest, and to win part of that sweet, sweet prize pot, you’ll have to hack a Nexus 6P and a 5X. You’ll have to do so only knowing the devices’ phone numbers and associated email addresses. Plus, the vulnerability you exploit must be able to remotely execute codes on both phones just by opening an email or a text message. The big G says it hopes to discover new bugs from the contest. But since it’s more than just a bug bounty program, it will also use your entries to take a closer look at how exploits work, as well as to gather info on how to protect its devices from similar vulnerabilities.

You may want to read the contest mechanics soon if you plan to participate, because it looks like only the first person who submits a particular bug can use it. If you get top prize once the contest ends in six months’ time, you can take home $200,000. You’ll get $100,000 for second prize, and at least $50,000 for third, which is still not bad at all.

Via: CNET

Source: Google