An anonymous reader writes: A new not-for-profit app, Be My Eyes, aims to help the visually-impaired by connecting them with volunteer users who can support them in their daily lives via live video calls. Once downloaded, Be My Eyes asks the user to identify as blind or sighted, to see if you require help or are offering it. When a blind person requests assistance the app scans the system for an available volunteer. The blind user connects with the volunteer over a video call and points to the item they would like described. Be My Eyes was created by Hans Jørgen Wiberg, a visually-impaired entrepreneur, at a startup event. Wiberg teamed up with Robocat, the Danish software studio behind Haze and Thermo, to make his vision a reality. Read more of this story at Slashdot.
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‘Be My Eyes’ App Crowdsources Help For the Blind
The only thing worse than all the junk mail stuffed in your mailbox is finding a card that’s actually addressed to you, but is covered in mounds of glitter. The shiny stuff ends up all over your hands, your face, and your home, and it’s all but impossible to clean up. So that’s why a glitter bomb, courtesy of ShipYourEnemiesGlitter.com , is the perfect prank. Read more… 
U.S. Central Command’s Twitter and YouTube accounts just lit up in a bad way. It looks like somebody who’s claiming to be ISIS managed to gain access to the account and is currently tweeting images of documents, allegedly internal CENTCOM documents. The first tweet links to a Pastebin post with links to downloads of “confidential data.” Read more… 
8chan, the online message board that brought you some of the nastiest shit on the internet ( and Gamergate! ) has had its domain seized by its Bahamas-based registrar. According to the takedown notice, “child abuse” content on the site is to blame. Guess the internet’s trolls will have to find a different bridge to hide under. [ Ars Technica ] Read more… 
Nerval’s Lobster writes Is the tablet market rapidly collapsing? Mobile-analytics firm Flurry doesn’t come to quite that stark a conclusion, but things aren’t looking too good for touch-screens that don’t qualify as “phablets.” According to Flurry’s numbers, full-sized tablets accounted for only 11 percent of new devices in 2014, a decline from 2013, when that form-factor totaled 17 percent of the new-device market; small tablets experienced a smaller decline, falling from 12 percent to 11 percent of new devices between 2013 and 2014. (Meanwhile, phablets expanded from 4 percent of new devices in 2013 to 13 percent this year.) Boy Genius Report, for its part, looked at those numbers and decided that the tablet market is doomed: “Consumers happy with compact smartphones are not switching to larger iPhones for now, but former tablet buyers are.” That’s not to say people will stop using tablets, but the onetime theory that they would one day cannibalize all PCs looks increasingly nebulous. Read more of this story at Slashdot. 
